


Exile Is Not For Everyone

by fictorium



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - The Proposal Fusion, Bisexual Female Character, British Character, Deception, F/F, Female Friendship, Female Protagonist, Femslash, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Government Agencies, Immigration & Emigration, Inspired by a Movie, Italian-American Character, Same-Sex Marriage, The Proposal AU, Wedding Planning
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-03-20 19:26:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 36,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3662115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictorium/pseuds/fictorium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's an AU based on the Sandra Bullock/Ryan Reynolds movie, 'The Proposal'! So. There's that.</p><p>If you haven't seen it then the premise is: bossy lady is a bit foreign, didn't sort out her visa, is now being booted by INS. Unless she can come up with a way to get issued a new and different type of visa, like say a fiancée or spouse type one.</p><p>Now just who could save Peggy's bacon in such a situation? Step forward one Ms Angie Martinelli. Only trouble is that INS want immediate proof of their serious relationship, and Angie is heading off to a huge family event. Ever the pal, she insists that Peggy can tag along. Family drama, wedding nonsense, and ridiculous shenanigans ensue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For the purposes of this story, let's assume that the 1940s, Italy, the United States, and the Catholic Church have gotten on board with same-sex marriages and f/f relationships in general. Yes? Good. 
> 
> This isn't a modern AU, because it just didn't fit somehow. Period drama stays period.
> 
> Title is from Edwidge Danticat's 'Brother, I'm Dying'.

“I don’t understand why we’re meeting here,” Peggy snarls across the table at Agents Thompson and Sousa. “When we have a perfectly serviceable office a matter of minutes away.”

“Sit tight, Carter,” Thompson smarms at her, adjusting his cufflinks for at least the third time. The idiot needs to find a tailor who can dress him in better-fitting clothes. “Ah, here’s the boss now to explain. Chief?”

“Stand down, agents,” Dooley tells them with a dismissive wave. “Get yourselves a slice of pie and a coffee while I talk to Miss Carter, here.”

“I think you mean Agent Carter,” Peggy snaps, relieved all the same to only be facing down the boss.

“That’s why I’m here,” Dooley continues, taking his seat opposite her. “You want anything? I could eat.”

“I’d rather you told me what all this is about before disturbing the waitress.” Peggy looks over at where Angie is hunched over the counter, engrossed in what appears to be yet another script. “The sooner you talk, the sooner we can get back to work."

“Me? Yeah. I got more paperwork than I got desk. But you? Not so much."

“You cannot be serious.”

“Don't I look serious, Carter? I'm about as serious as a heart attack right here. See, your Mr. Churchill might have been spouting off about this ‘special relationship’ between our countries, but the guys at INS don’t think it’s all that special. See, when you signed your little contract to come work for us the deal was-”

“That I renounce my British citizenship, yes.” Peggy sighs. These petty bureaucrats who think it matters which fake passport you travel on. She misses the war, when alliances meant more than simple borders. Now it’s all about disentanglement and turning on former allies. With every layer she gets pushed further from the heart of all things American, and from Steve by association. She loathes that this fact is what upsets her most of all. “Which I'm fairly sure I did?”

“You have to fill out forms, Carter. You can’t just put your British papers at the back of your closet and hope no one ever asks for them.”

Peggy snorts. They’re in her hidden wall safe, thank you _very much_.

"It's possible that slipped my mind," she concedes. "I'll get the forms and burn my old passport like one of your Salem witches, if that will please our friends at the DOJ?"

"It's no good, Carter." Dooley waves over at Angie, who only just registers him in her peripheral vision. "They already took your American citizenship. You'd need to find a way for Uncle Sam to invite you back into the fold. And leave the country in between times, to boot."

"Isn't there anyone I can talk to about-"

"Hi!" Angie interrupts. "Say, Peggy, this ain't that boss you're always complaining about, is it?"

"He certainly is," Peggy replies through gritted teeth. She's used to not introducing her colleagues, but owes Angie her place at least. "Sir, this is Angie Martinelli."

"You didn't say he was so handsome while you were ranting and raving," Angie retorts with a wink. "I woulda remembered that."

Dooley smiles at her, falling for the tip-based flirting. Angie knows someone on expenses when she sees them. 

"You're a lot nicer to me than Carter here." Dooley's glare at Peggy is more than a little accusatory. "Any chance I could get some coffee and a Danish, sweetheart?"

"Coming right up. Anything for you, English?"

Peggy shakes her head and Angie wanders off. There’s no small amount of relief that Angie didn’t point out to Dooley that the whole point of the Automat is self-service, and instead she uses her master key to retrieve a plated pastry.

"Listen, my hands are tied, kid. I know you've got friends in high places, but that's not doing squat for you here. So unless you got yourself a good old-fashioned Yankee husband stashed away, it looks like we gotta let you go."

He looks just a little too relieved at the prospect. Peggy thinks she might vomit, right there in the booth. It would be a little more satisfying if she could do so right over his breakfast, which Angie is carrying towards them. Angie. Smart, helpful, _actress_ Angie.

Peggy winks at her slowly, and Angie tilts her head in confusion.

“Here’s your, uh, order…” She says, placing Dooley’s coffee and Danish down without taking her eyes off Peggy, who no doubt looks an utter fool trying to convey a completely insane idea with eye contact alone.

“Well, Chief,” Peggy says, taking a very deep breath. “I might not have an All-American husband to my name, but I do have a very beautiful fiancée. That was with two ‘e’s, sir. Isn’t it, Angie?”

“Say what?”

“Oh honey, I know I said I wanted to keep it quiet, but my boss here needs to know about our relationship. Our engagement,” Peggy continues, as Angie’s jaw visibly drops. “To be married. Sweet. Heart.”

Dooley is so mortified that he’s staring at his coffee instead of anywhere in the region of Peggy. That moment of stunned disbelief is exactly what Peggy counted on, because it gives her a precious few seconds to make frantic but discreet gestures to Angie that amount, essentially, to ‘please go along with this’.

For a moment it seems Angie is caught too far off-guard to cooperate and save Peggy’s hide. Then she breaks into the biggest grin that Peggy has ever seen on her face, bigger even than the time she thought Lauren Bacall had dropped in for breakfast. She winks back at Peggy and starts to gush.

“Oh, I thought you’d never tell anyone, Peggy! I have to say I was worried about being your little secret. Especially with us getting married and all, I mean. How would we even keep that under wraps?”

“Right,” Peggy can barely contain her sigh of relief. “So how does that change things, exactly, sir? Now that I’ve been so honest with you?”

“Well, uh…” Dooley looks everywhere but at the two of them, finally alighting on Daniel. “Sousa, c’mere.” 

Sousa obliges, leaning a little heavier on his crutch today, Peggy notes. She’ll have to find a way to have a quiet word with him about finally seeing that VA prosthetic specialist. He doesn’t always react well to her well-intentioned advice. At the sight of him approaching, Angie slips into the booth beside Peggy, taking her hand just like a polite partner should. Peggy would usually want to squirm at the unexpected contact, and yet she doesn’t.

“What do you need, Chief?”

“Carter might not be leaving us after all. You know what she has to do if she’s gonna have an American spouse? The uh, change in the law with so many guys not making it back from Europe and Japan, and all...”

“She does?” Daniel looks at her, openly hurt for just a second. He gets his game face on almost immediately, but Peggy blushes lightly with something like embarrassment. She’s made it perfectly clear that she isn’t looking for another man. “I mean, uh, congratulations, Agent. I think all you need to do is get some forms stamped by the INS guys. The letters about you were from a Ms. Underwood. The office is somewhere downtown, just call Information.”

“Excellent. Carter, consider yourself on an early honeymoon. You call me with an estimated return date as soon as these desk jockeys give you one, all right?”

“Thank you, sir,” Peggy stands up. Angie does too, and for some reason they’re still holding hands. “I’ll just uh, leave you to your breakfast. Thank you. For understanding.”

“I’m on my break,” Angie says brightly as another waitress emerges from the kitchen, tying on her apron. “Got a minute to come in back, babe?”

Peggy glares at that. There are some liberties that absolutely cannot be taken.

“Of course. Gentlemen,” she says by way of excusing herself, following Angie through the swing door that leads into a cramped hallway full of boxes and cleaning supplies.

“Angie, I am so, so sorry,” Peggy begins. “I’ll think of something else, I swear. I just… you were right there, and I cannot lose my job.”

“Who can?” Angie asks. “Although I’ve never seen anyone so damn passionate about working for the phone company, English. You really need someone to marry you?”

“I couldn’t presume to-”

“Not like anyone else is asking, is it?” Angie smiles, waving away Peggy’s sympathy. “I’m only on ‘til lunch. You come back and get me, we’ll go fill out whatever papers they need, okay?”

"Angie, that is just beyond generous. Beyond, really it is."

"It's just a piece of paper. If we have to have a ceremony, well, it'll be fun to dress up. And good acting practice!" Angie looks over Peggy's shoulder to make sure her own boss isn't around. "We hang out plenty anyway, it won't be hard to convince any government snoops, right?"

"I suppose so." Peggy is hedging, she isn't sure at all about this latest bolt of impulse forced into an actual plan. "I'll swing by at two?" 

"You got it, English."

***

Angie is already changed and waiting out front when Peggy rolls up. She doesn't have that fancy car that Angie's seen her slip in and out of countless times, so it looks like they'll be taking the subway. 

As they walk to 59th Street station Angie chatters about the rest of her morning, including the tale of a bank robbery just around the corner that livened things up considerably. She hopes it will get Peggy to open up about her current work woes, but as ever she has nothing much to say. Even when most people would be cursing their bosses or letting rip about all the little tasks they wouldn't miss if they did get deported.

Instead, Peggy is the perfect listener. When Angie runs out of material, Peggy leans in a little on the half-deserted subway platform and asks, "Is that lipstick new? It looks smashing on you."

It's one of those moments when Angie is convinced that Peggy sees right through her. She has to know that British slang makes Angie weak in the knees, especially if it's busted out during the distinct invasion of her personal space. 

"I thought I'd better look my best," Angie replies, waving down at her pale green sundress and actual heels for once, ones that have been lying in her work locker since she started a shift straight from her cousin's christening a month ago. "Don't want the suits getting suspicious if I'm not in your league, right?"

"You're positively First Division," Peggy tells her with an enthusiastic little nod. Angie guesses that's a compliment, being first and all. "Me? I'm not so sure."

Before Angie can embarrass herself, the southbound N train comes rattling into the platform.

.***

The INS office looks like someone threw an Ellis Island reunion party, and Angie is staggered at first by the sheer volume of the crowd. On instinct she picks out the strands of Italian from the din. Some Sicilians on one side, Sardinians somewhere further into the waiting room. In the corner there's a furious, staccato conversation that can only be Bresciani, and Angie fights the urge to march over and start kissing cheeks. It’s what her mother would do.

Peggy has no such reaction, and immediately seizes on her advantage of speaking fluent English, looking sneakily official as she asks random questions and leverages her position in line. She returns with a stack of papers, triumphant, to Angie who's still barely three feet inside the door.

“Miss!” A random blonde appears from behind what must be a staff entrance. “Miss, just one moment.”

There it is again. That glint in Peggy’s eye that says she’s ready to run. Sure enough, her eyes dart to the exit, and the fire door on the far side of the lobby. Angie tenses, but when the staffer reaches Peggy, that perfectly fake smile of hers is back in place. 

“Can I help you?” Peggy asks, because even if she insults someone it still sounds as any Duchess.

“You’re Miss Carter, aren’t you? We were hoping that reaching out to your employers would get you to come and sort all this out. I can see you now, if you’d like?”

“Oh, of course,” Peggy’s smile gets just a bit more genuine. “Angie, darling. You’ve got time haven’t you?”

“Sure thing.” Angie nods enthusiastically. Her flight isn’t until tomorrow afternoon, anyway, and her case has been packed and repacked seven times already. She can do this favor for Peggy and make plans for when she’s back from Nonna’s birthday celebrations. She thinks Peggy might have flown some in the war, so maybe she can tell her what that’s going to be like if they get coffee after this.

“Take a seat,” the woman tells them both once they’re in her tiny, airless office. Every wall is piled high with stacks and stacks of files. “I’m Ms Underwood,” she announces, and Angie practically shivers at the frosty turn her tone has taken. “You may recognize that name from the many, many letters we sent you Ms Carter.”

“Well, not exactly. I didn’t really read them, you see. But my colleague did mention you,” Peggy admits. It’s that bashful ‘what a ditz’ routine that she thinks her accent and cheekbones can carry with anyone. 

Not, apparently, with this broad.

“The clerk informed me that you wish to register for a fiancée visa,” Underwood responds, tapping her pen against a clipboard that she hasn’t so much as asked them to look at yet. “Now, Margaret Carter. Is that because you wish to marry this young, presumably and conveniently American girl? Or is it actually a scheme to deceive and defraud the United States Government? Specifically, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, of which I am the New York section chief?”

Peggy, like anyone with have a brain, swallows hard.

“I can assure you, Ms Underwood-”

“Assurances mean very little to me. You thought you were above the system, didn’t you? Well, not on my watch. Citizenship of this great country is a privilege and you have abused it one time too many. I don’t care who you served with in the war.”

Peggy shoots a panicked glare at Angie. Well, there’s a story in there somewhere. 

“Miss Underwood?” Angie decides it’s time she helped. “We really do want to get married. I’ve never met anyone else like Peggy here.”

“Really? Married?” Underwood snorts. “We have interviews to test these claims, you know. If you’re caught lying you’re looking at 2 years in prison, Ms…”

“Martinelli,” Angie answers. “And that won’t be happening.” She takes Peggy’s hand again between their two chairs, just as simply as she did at the automat. It still makes her head go fuzzy and her heart skip at least one beat. “We’re the real deal, and we’ll prove it.”

“Angie-” Peggy is clearly starting to reconsider. 

“Only it can’t be right now, because I have packing to finish. Off to Italy tomorrow.”

“Really?” Underwood seizes on that. “And do you hold Italian citizenship, Ms Martinelli?”

“Nah, New York born and raised,” Angie assures her, squeezing Peggy’s hand gently just because she can. Peggy is starting at her in disbelief. “It’s my first time flying, actually. My dad, who was born in Brescia but he came here as a kid, all the papers are legit, just so you know... he wants to take us all back for Nonna’s 90th birthday.”

“To which you’ll naturally be taking your fiancée,” Underwood says, lip curling into a sneer. She has to know how the tickets cost an arm and a leg, way more than Angie’s ever seen written down before. Angie knows her dad has been doing really well these past few years, selling on Martinelli franchises to veterans going into the construction trade. There’s no way any of them can magic up another Pan Am ticket at short notice, though.

Peggy, thank God, gets her head back in the game. “Well, I was supposed to be working. The telephone company simply couldn’t spare me, you see. Only now it seems they can. Thanks to your inquiries.”

“It would also satisfy the immigration conditions of you leaving the country and reentering on a new visa,” Underwood points out. “Seems we’ll have to go with straight deportation instead. You’ll have to reapply through the London consulate.”

“You know, you’re right,” Peggy gasps. “Clearly Fate has played his hand here, allowing me to celebrate this joyous occasion with my new family. I’ll go directly to a travel agent as soon as we’re done here,” Peggy says, standing up and extending her hand. “I assume I’ll be able to reenter the country when we return on…?”

She looks back at Angie.

“Wednesday. Ten days from now,” Angie supplies. Peggy blanches, but takes it in stride.

“I’ll give you this temporary visa,” Underwood sighs. “And I’ll be waiting to greet you at Immigration myself. One sign of irregularity, Carter, and I won’t think twice about making you the first person to swim the Atlantic. Understood?”

“Perfectly,” Peggy is a little aggressive in her handshake, and Angie can’t say she blames her as she scrambles to follow her friend out of the INS office and into the questionably fresh air of downtown Manhattan.

“English!” Angie shrieks as soon as they’re across the road and three blocks down, the first time Peggy breaks her confident stride for a second. “Are you out of your mind? That ticket is a year’s rent, at least.”

“I have a friend who can help,” Peggy tells her through gritted teeth. “A travel agent, of sorts. Well, more of a pilot technically.”

“Jeez, I wish I’d known that when Papa was booking our trip,” Angie cracks. “Listen, this got serious way too fast, I get that. You don’t have to go along. I can play like I got a broken heart just as easy if INS need it. You can send me a postcard of Buckingham Palace and come back anyway you know how. I don’t want you to feel trapped in this plan, Peg.”

What Angie means is ‘don’t get trapped in this harebrained scheme where you have to pretend to love me back’, and she can’t believe she’s blowing her one half-chance so quickly. She should march Peggy across to City Hall and find a judge to sign a waiver, just like cousin Paulie did when his then-girlfriend went into labor and refused to give birth to ‘an Italian bastard’. Paulie says it saved them making a special trip to register the birth, anyway.

“How did I not know you’re going to Italy?” Peggy demands then, her dark eyes fixed on Angie in amazement. “It’s not like you to keep quiet.”

“I’m sure I mentioned it,” Angie hedges. “It’s just, I figured you’d be homesick. Me jetting off to Europe when you probably have family back there you miss, well. I’d have felt like a heel.”

“No family,” Peggy shakes her head, and that fake smile is plastered back on to stop Angie feeling bad for mentioning it. “Not really.”

“You sure you want to come all the way to Italy?” Angie asks. She already knows her family won’t mind. Angie’s been bringing home waifs and strays since she was old enough to toddle outside by herself, and Ma has never met a person she didn’t want to feed and interrogate. “We Martinellis can be a handful.”

“Having met you, I’ve no doubt,” Peggy says, but it seems like there’s genuine affection. “You’re really saving my bacon, Angie. What time do we need to be at Idlewild?”

“Well I imagine we’ll be arriving at the crack of dawn. But the actual flight leaves at one, I think.”

“Then I’d really better go get my ticket. Thank you, again. I’ll see you at dinner?”

“Sure thing, English.” Angie watches Peggy cross the road, dark skirt flaring at her knees as the breeze catches it. Any other day, she’d wander around the stores or go find a decent cup of coffee some place. Today though, she’d better get the final packing of her case done and make a call to her parents. 

***

It takes five full minutes for Ma to stop screaming. 

Well, not screaming so much as shrieking. Papa takes the phone in the interim, and Angie listens to him scold her mother in rapidfire Italian for her hysteria.

“She’s just excited, Angela,” he explains a moment later. “So many years she’s been asking when you’ll bring someone home to meet us, and now you pick this happy occasion to make her even happier!”

“I’m pleased. Listen Papa, Peggy’s not exactly like us, okay?”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s pretty quiet, I mean. Not a talker. Oh, she’s really classy and everything. Just not very… uh … Italian?”

“It’s not a crime,” Ma takes the phone back. “She’s real English, huh? All snooty sounding like Vivien Leigh?”

“Just like that, yeah. You really don’t mind her crashing the vacation? I know how long you guys have been planning it, and it’s already so great that you’re taking me and Frankie. I don’t want you saying it’s fine today and giving me hell for it on Tuesday, Ma.”

“Mind your language, Angela,” Ma warns.

“Don’t start with the girl, Franny,” Papa chimes in. “Whatever language she learned, she learned it at your knee. It’s no problem for you to bring your sweetheart, Angie. Separate rooms of course, we’re not so modern as to give up the rules altogether, but she’ll be more than welcome.”

“And it’s definitely Peggy? That’s got to be short for something, these lunatic Brits with their words that nobody says them the way they’re written…” Ma is off and running, and Angie feels the relief start to creep in for real.

“Short for Margaret, but I wouldn’t call her that unless she says so. I think because her parents gave her the name but they’re not with us any longer, you know?” Angie didn’t know Peggy had no family left until this afternoon, but she knows how to work with a detail or two. If Peggy wanted to be called anything but that she’d say so, and Angie knows how to nip her Ma’s little wonderings in the bud.

“Oh, of course,” Ma is somber again. “Your Nonna will be thrilled too. She always said we’d have trouble finding a man good enough for you. I guess she was right all this time, huh?”

“Nonna always is,” Angie laughs. “I gotta go pack, Ma. We’re having dinner early here, so you’ll pick us up in the morning?”

“Seven sharp,” Papa tells her. She groans, because that means half past six at the latest. 

“Sure. Leave room in the back for the two of us, okay? Tell Frankie he can’t lounge around back there like the only person in the world.”

“See you in the morning,” Ma says, and Angie hangs up after a few exchanged ‘Love you’s, far short of their usual routine. 

Well. That could have gone a lot worse.

***

Howard is, and Peggy wishes she was understating it, an absolute arse about the whole thing from start to finish. From offering to fly her himself to trying to send her to Paris instead, he relents only when she says she’s joining her ‘special someone’ on a family vacation, a term that costs her so much to actually spit out that she wants to kick him in the balls just for mentioning it.

Not to mention he’s made her late for dinner, which Angie always takes personally. It’s hardly the way to keep someone doing a huge, law-breaking favor for you onside. Thank God Howard got distracted by his stewardess friends before getting the identity of Peggy’s alleged squeeze out of her. That, she may never live down.

The Griffith is the usual hive of activity, girls lining their stomachs before heading out for a night of drinks and dancing. Peggy wishes she felt more envious of them, but her foul mood lifts only at the sight of Angie, wielding two plates stacked with meat and potatoes, settling them down at the far end of the communal dining table. 

Peggy feels strangely shy as she waves at Angie, like she’s just identified her blind date with a rose in her lapel at Grand Central station. The minute they take their seats Angie’s pouring out water for Peggy, milk for herself, and asking fifteen different questions about tickets and if Peggy needs any help to pack. It’s going to be a lot warmer in Italy already, according to Angie’s parents, so they can leave their frumpy winter clothes behind.

“I don’t know how I’m gonna get to sleep tonight!” Angie finishes, stuffing a piece of bread into her mouth. 

“Speaking of sleeping arrangements,” Peggy begins. “We might run into a spot of bother here if the INS come looking for our marital bed.”

“Oh, it’s just boys Miriam has a problem with,” Angie says after she swallows. “Hell, some of the girls think this hotel is just a recruitment center, if you know what I mean. If someone comes asking if we’re married and shacked up together, she’ll be happy to take the credit for it.”

“Well, wonders will never cease.” Peggy pushes a potato around her plate. “I can throw a bag together tonight, but I got the impression on the way back here that someone was following me.”

“Like a spy?” Angie gasps. “No way!”

Her enthusiasm is pretty adorable. Even Peggy would have to admit that. Though not out loud until thumbscrews got involved, thankfully.

“I’m probably being paranoid. After all, it’s just a little immigration issue.”

“I dunno, English,” Angie considers. “That broad sure seemed to have it in for you. Maybe her phone bills are too high. Nah, all things considered it’s safer if you bunk in with me tonight. I don’t mind sleeping on the floor.”

“I will not kick you out of your own bed,” Peggy declares, straightening her spine in defiance. She hasn’t shared a bed with anyone since boarding school, and it seems like a terrible weakness to start now. The thought of consigning poor, helpful Angie to the hard floor the night before a long flight is unthinkable. Peggy doesn’t much fancy it for her own back, either.

“Then we share,” Angie decides. “I sleep like a log anyway, and I don’t have you pegged for a blanket hog.

“You’d be surprised,” Peggy warns. She should put up more resistance, honestly. She should sleep in her own room and say it isn’t proper to share a bed before marriage, sham or otherwise. The trouble is it’s been a bloody awful day, and what she wants more than anything is a little human contact. A body beside her with some compassion and a kind word, instead of shadows and the ghosts of loved ones long since gone. The thought of that particular body being Angie’s makes Peggy feel lighter somehow, and if it helps this particular problem, so much the better all round. “Okay, I’ll knock on your door once I’m packed.”

“See? Getting on like a house on fire. We’ll make a decent wife of you yet, won’t we?”

Peggy snorts. She may be many things, but she can’t ever see herself as a wife.


	2. Chapter 2

Peggy wakes before dawn, a habit she blames on a body clock that’s never fully acclimatized to American time. For a moment she feels unusually serene, drifting into wakefulness instead of being jarred by either an alarm clock or an intruder. She flips her pillow, luxuriating in the feel of the cool side against her face, and hums a half-remembered tune underneath her breath.

That, it turns out, is enough to rouse Angie.

The same Angie who, sometime during the night, has turned from their mutually agreed back-to-back arrangement and clamped her limbs around Peggy with the grip of a hermit crab. 

“What’s with the musical, Ethel Merman?” Angie grumbles, but she makes no move to disentangle them. Peggy is a little surprised at how strange it isn’t.

“The alarm will go off in a minute,” Peggy answers. “I was just enjoying the morning.”

“Doesn’t sound like you,” Angie snorts, and a moment later she’s gently snoring again. 

Peggy wriggles a little, and Angie lets go with sleepy reluctance. Bolting for the solitude of the bathroom, she flips on the light and removes the headscarf that holds her pin curls in place. Facing herself down in the mirror, Peggy takes a steadying breath.

It doesn’t mean anything that she woke up happy. It doesn’t mean anything that she woke up bursting into song thanks to genuine rest beside Angie. It can’t mean anything, because there’s the small matter of more than 20 hours of flying, any number of effusive Italians, and reentering the United States to consider.

Distance. Polite and professional distance is the key. Peggy’s been doing nothing but that since Steve’s plane went into the water, and she can get right back to it. 

If she smiles at her reflection while thinking that, well. These things do happen.

***

Angie braces herself as soon as they approach the turn in the staircase. Usually Papa would just wait in the car for her, but the addition of Ma plus the newness of Peggy guarantees a pre-dawn invasion of the Griffith’s lobby.

“Hey,” Angie greets them in a loud whisper, waving like she just got back on shore leave and isn’t sure they’ll recognize her. Peggy bumps right into Angie’s case as she comes to a stuttering halt beside her. “We gotta keep it down, breakfast hasn’t officially started yet.”

Ma, naturally, doesn’t listen to a word. She’s already off and running, chattering nineteen to the dozen about the drive there and how Frankie is still in the car, no matter how much she told him about manners, and Angie turns just enough to see that Peggy is totally dumbstruck.

For a moment, Angie can’t see why. She looks at her folks, really looks at them for the first time in too long, and tries to frame them with the eyes of a stranger. If they were a strange couple at the railway station, Ma the type of woman Angie had to research for a role, what would she notice about them?

She’d see the love in the way Papa’s hand never leaves the small of Ma’s back, even though she probably can’t feel it through that smart new wool coat she’s wearing, something the day will be too hot for in about an hour, but it must be new. Angie smiles at the way that Ma squints just a little at them, forever and always too proud to admit she might need a pair of glasses. It’s overwhelming suddenly, the tug of home. Angie bounds the rest of the way across the foyer to be enveloped in a strong double hug.

“English, come meet the folks,” Angie announces after Papa has kissed her on both cheeks and Ma has fixed the one bit of her hair that wasn’t laying right at all. Angie collects Peggy, steering her by the elbow into a new round of greetings and questions that nobody ever hears enough of to actually answer. It’s nodding and noise and Angie knows they’d better scram before Miriam Fry is roused from her scary little cave in the basement.

“It’s very kind of you to let me come along,” Peggy is saying as they head towards the door, her natural charm snapping back into place. “When Angie said she would be away for ten whole days, well. You can imagine.”

“We’re happy to have you, Peggy,” Ma insists. “Lord knows I could do with another lady around here to keep me company. I hope Angie told you how happy we are that she finally feels she can bring a young woman to meet us.”

“Oh, she was thrilled. Chattered all evening about it,” Peggy insists, although Angie did no such thing. “She really hasn’t brought anyone to ‘meet the folks’ before?”

Hey, Angie thinks. That’s a lot like snooping. She tries to nudge Peggy, but they’re negotiating their way into the backseat of the car. Of the many ways Angie has pictured getting Peggy in the back of a car, having her brother staring back at them in sullen silence didn’t feature once. Nor, funnily enough, did her parents beaming at them from the front seats.

“Angela hasn’t brought anyone home since she tried to convince herself about Vincent Falco in the eighth grade,” Ma confides. “Isn’t that right, sweetheart? Worried we’d scare them off, weren’t ya?”

“No, Ma,” Angie groans, wriggling in her middle seat and punching Frankie to move his lanky frame over some more. At this rate Peggy will have to ride in Angie’s lap, and this morning is difficult enough without keeping sane through that. 

“I can already tell that’s impossible,” Peggy chimes in, smooth as any guy in pinstripes. “It would take much more than this warm welcome to scare me away from Angie.”

Papa nods approvingly, meeting Angie’s eye in the rearview mirror. Obstacle one cleared, then.

“Let’s go already!” She pleads. Sitting back, Angie sighs as Frankie stares out of the window instead of introducing himself to Peggy. She’ll kick his ass about manners later, but there’s a whole crazy day and night of travel to get through first. 

***

It’s all perfectly simple until they’re seated on the plane. Peggy and Angie are together, naturally, but on the opposite side to the rest of the Martinellis. It’s then that Angie turns towards Peggy, eyes positively sparkling with mischief.

“So, English. Ready for some serious cramming?” 

“Excuse… excuse me?” Peggy splutters.

“The way I figure it we’ve got a bunch of natural breaks built into this crazy ride. So from here to New-found-land-”

“Newfoundland,” Peggy automatically corrects the pronunciation. She’s flown through it a few times. 

“Right. Nowheresville, Canada. So from here to there I figure we get up to speed on all the stuff you never tell me. I don’t want to look like a fraud in front of everyone, and I can’t keep making up the details about you, you know?”

“I’m afraid I don’t,” Peggy answers, wincing a little at how transparently she’s playing for time. She hasn’t remotely had time to prefer a convincing narrative, and none of her fly-by-night aliases amount to much more than a wig and a change of lipstick shade, all told. “Do enlighten me.”

“Well, you don’t know the first thing about me in a lot of ways,” Angie accuses, arms folded above her seatbelt on the instant defensive. “Apart from my moaning about auditions, we don’t always go that deep, do we?”

“Try me,” Peggy insists.

“Favorite color,” Angie demands.

“Peach,” Peggy fires back with confidence. “I imagine someone once told you that it looks beautiful with your complexion. They were right, by the way.”

Angie’s jaw drops in surprise.

“Another?” Peggy asks, sweet as a sugar cube. 

“Yeah, because I’m pretty sure you just got lucky. What’s your favorite color, English?”

“I’ve always been partial to a nice, bold red. Poppies, a good lipstick, even the a shiny cherry on a cocktail stick. It’s cheering.”

“And good old red, white and blue, right?” Angie teases. “You’re gonna have to get more American than Captain America as well as pretending to be in love with me.”

She’s deflected, Peggy thinks to herself. Unfortunately she is, too, by mention of Steve. One day it won’t throw her quite so much, she’s sure of it. It just doesn’t appear to be any day soon.

And Peggy really should have known that Angie wouldn’t be so easily deterred.

“Bet you don’t know my favorite food, because I’ve never eaten it with you. If you say my Ma’s lasagna, I’ll know you’re guessing, too.”

“That’s because,” Peggy throws her voice a little for the next part. “While you always rave about your Ma’s cooking,” she quiets again to their private, murmured conversation with their heads bowed together once more. “Your all-time favorite dish is when your dad makes cannolis. He sends them whenever you get sick, you told me once.”

“Jeez, you got a mind like a steel trap. Now I feel even worse that I can’t break down that frosty exterior of yours, Peg. You give out fewer secrets than the Kremlin.”

Peggy, who has personally liberated more than one state secret from that very building under the guise of a diplomatic mission, can’t help but smirk just a little. One point wounds her though, at least when it comes from Angie.

“Frosty? I thought we were friends.”

“You know what I mean. You’ve got the biggest heart on the block, but any time we get onto personal stuff you cha-cha out of there quicker than one of Howard Stark’s women slipping out before breakfast.”

“Well, what don’t you know?”

“Why you don’t have family waiting for you in London,” Angie blurts it out, and Peggy can’t see she didn’t really mean to, but it stings a little all the time.

“I lost my parents when I was quite young,” Peggy can’t bear to supply the details, but she knows that total vagueness won’t help this time. “It was a train crash, of all things. My grandmother raised me, but her health… well, boarding school was the best solution all around.”

“I can’t imagine going away from my family that young,” Angie breathes, looking across the aisle at them. “Heck, I can’t get away from them now and I’m in my twenties.”

“I suppose you have a lot to miss,” Peggy says kindly. “It would have been harder, I think. If I’d been older.”

“Well hey,” Angie lights up. “At least you get some in-laws for a while, right? Buy one Martinelli, get the rest free.”

Peggy laughs. “I assume you have more questions to tide us over to Canada?”

“More? I got a million,” Angie tells her, her smile every bit as genuine as the one pulling at Peggy’s lips. “Get ready for your grilling, Miss Carter.”

***

The game wears off early in the second leg of the trip. The roar of the engines is more pervasive out over the open water, and truth be told they’re all either too tired or too nervous about their first crossing of the Atlantic to chatter much. Peggy tries gamely to stay awake and act like a tourist, too, but her Pavlovian response to travel has always been to nap on the most readily available surface. A martini from the stewardesses on departing Newfoundland seals the deal, and it’s only when they begin the descent into Limerick many, many hours later that Angie shakes her awake.

“We’re coming up on Britain!” Angie squeaks.

“Ireland isn’t in Britain,” Peggy grumbles. “Although for the last few hundred years, that’s mostly depended on who you ask.”

“Still!”

“Angie, if when we fly across the French coast at Brest I shout ‘look, it’s Italy!’ would you let that pass?”

“I guess not. But then I don’t know France from my elbow, so I guess you can do what you like.”

“Exactly. Do you think we’ll have time for a decent cup of tea?” Peggy’s can feel her heart lifting at the thought. It might not be home, exactly, but at least the Irish know their teabags from their milk. 

“Yeah, it’s a couple of hours or so.”

***

No one is talking by the time they land in Milan.

Exhaustion doesn’t even begin to cover it. Peggy can withstand it, and sleeping for Britain has certainly helped, but she’s taken aback at the condition of her traveling party. Their limbs are reduced to the shuffling motions of Frankenstein’s monster, and it’s down to her to coordinate a porter and have their bags retrieved.

“Will there be a welcoming party?” Peggy asks Frankie, the most alert besides herself, though that isn’t saying much. 

“Nah. Nonna doesn’t know we’re coming so we couldn’t risk one of the family coming to get us. Well, that was the plan,” Frankie says with a wince as a torrent of Italian speakers burst through the door. “Uh… plan changed?”

Peggy braces herself for impact as they’re all swept up in a sea of bodies. Usually being rushed like this would have her primed for some defensive maneuvers, but she’s boneless with exhaustion.

“Angie?” She squeaks as the volume of Italian increases. There are kisses and hugs flowing in every direction, and Peggy has been on the receiving end of too many already considering no one has the first clue who she is. Angie wriggles free from some aunt or cousin or other and links her arm through Peggy’s. 

“You realize this is about half of them, right?” Angie leans in to tell her, breath tickling against Peggy’s ear. “You speak any Italian?”

Peggy shakes her head. German, French, Russian, sure. She hasn’t had time to pick up another romantic language, and Mussolini was rarely on her patch during wartime. 

Eventually Angie’s father calls a sort of calm, his tired face illuminated with joy as he barks rapid-fire Italian at various groups. Angie nods and guides Peggy towards a kindly-looking older gentleman, disentangling to greet him with effusive kisses on both cheeks.

“Uncle Sal here speaks some English,” Angie explains. “He came over with Papa but got homesick two years in, ain’t that right?”

“America is not for me,” Sal agrees.

“Sometimes I’m not sure it’s for me,” Peggy says, offering a hand to shake. As expected, it’s taken only to pull her into a generous hug, something she’s finding less uncomfortable with each passing experience. It’s actually quite pleasant to be welcomed for once, to be wanted by people with no agenda. “I do hope Italy suits me.”

“Italy suits everyone,” Angie squeals. “I can’t believe I’m finally here.”

She launches into a conversation with Sal, the Italian hesitant enough in places for Peggy to get the gist. Something about keeping secrets from Nonna and half the village being missing. There’s something about a saint in there that seems to be the basis of the excuse, and Peggy nods along as best she can.

Their initial group is dispersed into various cars and trucks, and Peggy is a little relieved not to be separated from Angie at this early stage. Sal, his wife and his son offer them a lift in a well-maintained Fiat Cabriolet, which even Peggy is a little taken with. It’s clear that the car is Sal’s pride and joy, so they all take their time in getting in, oohing and ahing appropriately to make him beam.

“Well,” Peggy confides when they’re safely underway once more. “That wasn’t too bad, was it?”

“That was just the warm up,” Angie replies, her laugh a little manic with exhaustion. “Trust me, English. You ain’t seen nothing yet.”


	3. Chapter 3

Angie can’t quite believe that Peggy falls asleep by the second turn in the road, but she looks so peaceful, and she’s leaning against Angie’s shoulder. For that alone, Angie isn’t waking her anytime soon.

The wind whipping around them makes conversation mostly impossible, so Angie simply drinks it in. She’s heard so much from her father, the nostalgic tales of a man in the clutches of homesickness and grappa. The farmlands give way to factories and shells of buildings, the ravages of Allied bombing apparent the closer they get to the first town. 

But even Angie’s adrenalin rush can’t power her for much longer. Somewhere in drinking in the trees and buildings and sun-kissed skies, she blinks one time too many.

***

Peggy wakes up with a crick in her neck, startled to find that she’s positively cuddled into Angie’s side. The car has stopped in front of a handsome house, she’d call it sprawling if it weren’t so immaculately built. Though the materials are modest, the craftmanship is top-notch, and Peggy can see the proof of it. She’s grown so used to bomb-scarred landscapes, even after her time in New York, that it’s a relief every time she encounters a home that’s beautiful but unscathed. 

If the airport welcome was raucous, it’s nothing compared to the bustle that awaits them inside what has to be Nonna’s house. The huge reception room, dark beams streaking across the low ceiling, seems to swell as they walk in. Peggy scans the crowd out of habit, letting the Italian wash over her as she listens for her own language, the tells and signs of spycraft. The hierarchy of the family’s generations, the pecking order of brothers and sisters, the careful intrusion of neighbors, Peggy can divine most of it at a glance. 

Her surveying of the scene is interrupted by Angie’s mother, freshly arrived and leading Peggy down a corridor off the living room, calling out something in Italian to whomever is bustling along behind them.

“Here,” Mrs. Martinelli announces. “It seems our best intentions for unmarried couples are no match for Mamma’s arranging. You and Angie are getting hitched, you get a room together.”

“If it isn’t proper--” Peggy starts to protest.

“Don’t worry,” Angie interrupts, dragging her case in at that moment. “It seems Ma here already got quite the telling off. My Italian ain’t as hot as it should be, but I know ‘six months’ and ‘Frankie’ when I hear it. Seems your wedding anniversary is a little out, huh?”

“Angela Valentina Martinelli, if you sass me once more I will make you swim back to Brooklyn, you understand me?”

“Where d’ya want this?” Frankie grunts from the doorway, hoisting Peggy’s bags up to shoulder height. At her nod, he dumps them on the blanket box that sits at the foot of a huge wooden bed frame, elevated on a platform in the very center of the room. “Hey, how come they’re bunking in together, Ma?”

“Angela…” Mrs. Martinelli’s single word is warning enough, and Frankie takes the hint with a shrug. 

“We’ll be on our best behavior, Ma,” Angela promises sweetly. “I don’t know what you’re assuming, but Peggy here is a real lady.”

“You see that she is.”

“I promise too, Mrs. Martinelli” Peggy offers, rolling her eyes at the guilt she feels despite never having done anything more daring than hold Angie’s hand. 

“Francesca will do fine, Peggy. You see you keep that promise now, both of you.”

“Shall we freshen up, Angie? I don’t know what plans you have for-”

“Sleep!” Angie and her mother chorus. “We get to rest until dinner, that’ll give the circus out there a chance to situate itself,” Angie continues. “Once the sun starts going down though, all bets are off. It’s the full Martinelli dinner experience. So brace yourself, English.”

“I’ll see you girls in a while,” Francesca confirms, stifling a yawn. She makes a point of leaving the door unclosed, but Angie walks right over and slams it behind her.

“Well,” Peggy says, breaking the suddenly stifling silence. “This is a beautiful room.”

“Sorry about the sleeping arrangements,” Angie mutters, squinting up at the ceiling like it might have some elaborate fresco worth her attention. “I forgot that Nonna’s a bit of a renegade, you know? Rumor has it she’s the reason Mussolini never made any inroads into this town.”

“But we’re near his war camp, aren’t we?”

“You sure you never did your, uh, nursing over here during the war?”

“Never made it south of the Alps,” Peggy assures her, which is really only true if you tilt your head and squint at the map. “You can have the bathroom first, since I got plenty of sleep on the plane.”

“Don’t get your hopes up, it’s a sink and a wobbly toilet,” Angie calls out from the small en-suite. “You can take the bed, though.”

“Not this again,” Peggy sighs, telling herself that there’s no agenda whatsoever. “You pick your side and we’ll be perfectly fine for a week.”

“If you say so,” Angie says around a mouthful of toothbrush.

***

They must be the last to rise, but the scent of roasting meat, powerful garlic and something deliciously citrusy has them all but roused from beneath the covers by the tips of their noses. Angie’s stomach grumbles loudly, and she blushes at the thought of Peggy hearing it.

Quite content to pull on a simple cotton dress, Angie is stopped in her tracks by the gorgeous satin number Peggy unpacks. Her curls are a little mussed from the pillow, but in a matter of moments the dress is on and mostly zipped, and she’s scrunching the curls with fingers wet in the little sink to breathe some life back into them. The whole time Angie is staring, totally captivated by the transformation in front of her.

“Come along,” Peggy chides gently as she reaches for her compact and lipstick. “Oh, am I overdoing it?”

“Not at all,” Angie says, swallowing around a sudden lump in her throat. “I’m just gonna need a cattle prod to keep my cousins in line. You don’t mind a few wolf whistles, do ya?”

“Never bothered me before,” Peggy responds with a tight smile. “Did you bring that dress with the flowers you bought the other week? Only I was thinking the green of the pattern rather complements this old green thing, wouldn’t you say?”

Angie nods. Of course. The biggest benefit of a gal pal is supposed to be swapping or at least coordinating your wardrobes. Trust Peggy to be better at the lifestyle that Angie’s ever managed so far, in her few furtive attempts. She retrieves the dress Peggy is talking about, a knockoff of something she saw Ava Gardner wearing in fact, the cinched waist making the bold rose pattern flow really quite nice across the black material. A few pins in her hair and the strappy sandals that have held up pretty well since last summer, and Angie can feel herself stand a little taller.

“We should get in there before the carnage,” she says, stepping up next to Peggy to fix her own, lighter, makeup at the room’s large freestanding mirror, the wood a perfect match to the bedframe. “That is if you want to eat.”

“I could eat a horse,” Peggy confesses. “You’ll keep me right on what to say and who to say it to? The last thing I want is to ruin your family vacation for you.”

“You’ll be great,” Angie assures her. “You always are.”

***

Peggy is seated between Angie and her less talkative brother at the long table, which is about the best she can hope for, all things considered. Perhaps in an hour or so she can slip away, read some of the files she’s secreted away in the lining of her suitcase. In fact, the north of Italy isn’t a terrible base for her current inquiries. She might even manage a day or two away, overnight trains and being able to leave Angie somewhere safe permitting. Miss Underwood’s campaign of inconvenience might turn out convenient after all.

“So,” Frankie finally says under the guise of handing her something quite delicious with courgettes and tomatoes all over the plate. “What’s your deal, Carter?”

“Excuse me?” Peggy flicks a glance to Angie, who’s deep in conversation with a female cousin on the opposite side of the table.

“No way Angie keeps a secret like you for a weekend, never mind the months and months it takes to get to engaged. I notice none of you wearing a ring, neither.”

“Well,” Peggy stalls for a brief moment. “I didn’t have you pegged for a detective. The NYPD must be very proud.”

“Don’t have to be a cop to know when something don’t smell right,” Frankie continues. “Truth is, for all this equality crap, I still figure a gal like you is looking more for a guy like me than my kid sister.”

“Jealousy does not become you, Francesco.”

“It’s Frankie. How’d you two even meet?”

Which, naturally, is the moment for his father to pass behind them and overhear. 

“Oh yes, yes! Peggy, Angie, please. Share the story of how you two met. It’ll make this first dinner here a real occasion.”

Peggy looks around in quiet horror, noting that Sal and a few others bend to a seatmate and translate quickly and quietly for them. She clutches Angie’s hand beneath the table in desperation.

“It’s a funny story, really,” Peggy begins, forcing a smile from her lips. “But really, Angie here tells it so much better than I do. Must be the actress in her?”

“Gee thanks, English,” Angie mutters, before summoning up a bright smile of her own. She stares at her glass of red wine for a long moment, the room hanging on her next word, and Peggy can feel sweat prickling at the base of her neck. Maybe this is the time to come clean, and just beseech everyone to help her out in a few days when they next have to deal with Immigration. “So, it was one of those days, you know? The Automat is slammed with morons, nobody can make change, the rain is pouring down like the sky burst a pipe or something.”

Peggy risks a smug little glance at Frankie. He doesn’t look convinced yet, but if Angie can do any one thing spectacularly, it’s talk for America. And possibly Italy. Simultaneously. 

“Anyway, I just get done serving this jerk who thinks a tip is something you only find on a shoe, right? Then in walks this little lady, soaked from head to toe.”

“I forgot my umbrella,” Peggy chimes in, determined to be helpful.

“Anyway, I brought her a towel from in back, poured her the biggest cup of coffee we had, and that was the start of it,” Angie says, pausing for a second before twisting in her seat to peck Peggy softly on the cheek. The touch feels like electricity, and Peggy only just manages to swallow her gasp. 

“That’s not much of a story, Angela,” her dad teases, taking his seat at the end of the table, beaming at them. “I hope your engagement is more dramatic. Even we haven’t heard that one.”

Peggy can just feel the smug 'I told you so' radiating at the side of her head. She doesn't turn to acknowledge it.

"Right," Frankie agrees. "Angie, shut your yap for a change and let Miss DeHavilland here tell us all about it."

Peggy reaches for her wine, which is probably a nice local vintage but it suddenly tastes like malt vinegar on her tongue. Another time that might make her long for a crisp piece of haddock and some mushy peas, but this is hardly the time for genuine reminiscence when she has a whole relationship to fabricate. Really, how dare Frankie imply that Peggy is either too good or not good enough for Angie? It's more likely he detects a whiff of fraudulence about them, and the professional side of Peggy grits her teeth at the thought of being exposed in such an amateur fashion.

"Ciara!" Angie gasps, just as Peggy draws breath to start weaving her tale. "What the heck are you doing here?"

"Angela, Angela!" The willowy brunette who's just entered the dining room looks like she got lost on her way to a Milan catwalk. "I couldn't believe my ears when I heard the Martinellis were finally coming here."

"That's Ciara," Frankie leans in to explain, his grin maddening. "Her family lived down the block from us until just before the war. Angie was crazy about her, but not every family's as welcoming as ours, if you know what I mean."

"I'm sure I can guess," Peggy grits out. "Angie, darling, won't you introduce us? I confess I'm just greedy for someone else who speaks such beautiful English."

"Yeah, just like Queen Victoria, via Red Hook," Ciara says with a beaming smile and a ladylike snort. She bends to kiss Angie's cheek, before straightening and offering a hand to Peggy. When they shake, her palm is warm but dry, and Peggy's mortified to discover that somewhere between dressing and now her own hands have become clammy. "You're the real deal though, huh? I heard a Brit had swept Angie off her feet. I said, that, I have to see."

Another chair is conjured up, another glass filled and passed to Ciara. She's really very lovely, Peggy is forced to concede, with her long brown curls spilling down her back, sun kissed to a deep olive by the Italian summer sun, and her face is as beautiful as it is expressive, with serious but sparkling eyes and a wide mouth. Her smile is charmingly crooked, though after a moment it starts to remind Peggy unsettlingly of one Miss Dottie Underwood.

Ciara assures one of Angie's aunts that she ate already, her Italian rapid and rolled like only a native can do consistently. She takes a small plate with bread, oil and vinegar to calm the fuss before turning back to Angie and Peggy.

"I interrupted, didn't I?"

"Yeah," Frankie leaps in to confirm, his cropped dark hair maddeningly too short for Peggy to reach out and yank in a doomed bid to shut him up. "We're just hearing about the romance of the century, here."

"Francesco," Angie's dad warns, but the table falls to an expectant hum again. For a moment, Ciara's smile falters and Peggy is quite sure she's on the end of a momentary death glare. Interesting.

"Yes, and perhaps Ciara can help with the translating, too. Wouldn't want anyone to miss this little fable," Peggy begins, tearing at a piece of crusty bread to stop her fingers from trembling. "Not that it's anything special, really."

"Ever since I moved to New York I've been just fascinated by the Empire State Building. I think it's a real marvel, but the problem is I'm just terrified of heights." Peggy lies smoothly, because while she's hurled herself out of planes with little thought beyond the right moment to pull the cord, it's never exactly been pleasant to get up that high in the first place. "And Angie, dear sweet Angie, she's known of this little dilemma for some time. Ever since that first day we met, with all that rain."

Peggy pauses for another sip of wine, letting the rapid fire translation continue on for a moment. She remembers this kind of briefing from the Allied theatres, and the comfort that brings is an odd but pleasant few seconds.

"So last week, I was leaving my job at the telephone company," Peggy continues, reaching for Angie's nearest hand without thinking, and giving it a squeeze. "And Angie is waiting for me picnic basket over one arm. I assume we're heading to Greeley Square, one of our favorite little lunch spots. The sky is as gray as stone, but I don't want to spoil the gesture, you see."

"That was pretty nice of you," Angie cracks.

"There we are, strolling along 5th Avenue without a care in the world, and yes, I know that marvelous building is coming up. Not that I think a single thing about it when Angie stops and asks me if I trust her. Well, I told her. Angie, you must be the person I trust most in this world. With my confidences, and well, with my heart."

The chorus of 'awww's begins even before the translations can be fully rendered. 

"She takes the scarf I bought her as a birthday present and wraps it carefully around my head. I can barely see a thing, but she guides me. We must have looked quite mad, but then again, it is New York."

"So not the weirdest thing anyone's seen there, that's for sure," Francesca chimes in, getting into the spirit despite her earlier reprimands. Peggy can feel herself getting caught up in the cover, the thrill of a lie told well as invigorating as the first splash of tea on a cold morning. Francesca repeats her own comment in Italian, and the laughter around the table is cheering.

"The next thing I know I hear the ping of a lift, and my tummy did that funny little flip thing, you must know what I mean?" Peggy doesn't wait for confirmation. "What feels like a split second later, she's pulling the scarf off and there we are: stepping out on the deck of the Empire State Building."

Angie is looking at her with something like wonder, and though it distracts Peggy for a second, she supposes it can only help sell the big romance.

"I should be terrified, but Angie's right there the whole time. Holding my hand, just like she is now." Peggy thinks of it a moment too late, and she's sure it looks awkward, but she pulls Angie's hands to her mouth, dipping slightly to kiss her softly on the knuckles. "And there was the city I've come to love, all laid out like a tapestry. I don't think I can do it justice, but I can assure you, it was one of the best moments of my whole life."

"But it got even better, right?" Angie's dad winks at them in encouragement.

"Quite right," Peggy agrees, seizing on the potential for a big finale. "Just as I thought I couldn't be happier, my fear finally vanquished, Angela here turns to me and blurts out, 'hey English, you ever think we should get married?'" Everyone laughs at Peggy's affecting of Angie's voice, pretty accurate if she says so herself. 

"What can I say?" Angie says around a giggle of her own. "I'm a poet."

"Only before I can answer, there's this astounding crack of thunder, and the heavens open on us. I laugh, perhaps because I'm so used to the weather raining on my plans, but I notice right away that Angie's upset."

"Of course I was!" Angie joins in with gusto. "I mean, I just screwed up the proposal, and I've done it by dragging you up some building you're scared of, and to top it all off it's pouring with rain."

"But like I told you, darling. That was a sign. Rain brought me into the Automat for the first time, and I like to think someone up there was showing us their approval of your no-nonsense way of asking. Well, what could I say then but yes?"

As the story concludes, actual applause breaks out as the words are conveyed to each set of ears. 

"Hey, don't be prudes now," Frankie goads. "Story like that deserves a real kiss, wouldn't you say?"

"Oh Angela," Francesca pulls a hanky from her sleeve. "I had no idea you two were so crazy for each other. I mean, you can see the spark between you for miles, but it's so beautiful that you're so serious about each other. A kiss is right, Frankie! Nobody here is gonna mind, and they'll get my foot up their ass if they do."

"Ma!" Angie yelps. "Come on, stop embarrassing me you guys. That kind of thing is private, I won't have you teasing me for the rest of the week!"

"Dai, baciatevi!" Nonna pipes up from the far end of the table. Angie looks at Peggy in alarm, but Peggy knows the situation needs to be handled now, if the pressure is to be off them for the rest of the week. She lays a careful hand on Angie's shoulder, drawing her a little closer in the process.

"Sell it," she murmurs, letting her eyes flutter closed as she leans in the rest of the way.

***

Angie's been keeping up with this Coney Island coaster of a conversation pretty darn well so far, she reckons, but in a million years she did not see any of this happening. From Ciara - Ciara Bonpensiero! - showing up out of the blue, to the single most romantic lie she's ever heard, now she's suddenly supposed to kiss her fake future wife. Hell - sorry Jesus - how did Peggy even know that since she the first time she saw it, Angie's been dreaming of a big romantic scene at the top of the Empire State? Angie knows she's never admitted that to a living soul.

Now Peggy's squeezing her shoulder, and leaning in like Clark Gable on his best day, and Angie hasn't even kissed anybody in, what, over a year? But her lips are trembling already desperate for this stolen moment with Peggy. So what if it's only for a green card? She's treating Peggy right, and she's the one starting all this kissing talk and oh...

Peggy's kissing her. 

Angie has to mentally kick herself to actually kiss back, so stunned is she by the feel of Peggy's creamy red lipstick against her own paler pink one, but even through those thin layers of cosmetics, it's warm and soft and Jesus, Mary, Joseph and what the hell, throw in the Wise Men and St. Jude while they're at it, because Angie Martinelli is a lost cause.

The cheering and whooping around them is like a whisper under the thundering of Angie's heart, drowning out every thought but _kissing Peggy, oh God it's good, God help me, kissing Peggy Carter._

"Well," Peggy says, pulling back a moment later. Angie opens her eyes just to see if Peggy felt anything at all, and the flush in her cheek and the sparkle in those dark eyes maybe, just maybe, suggests that she's at least a little excited about it all too. "Think we can get back to dinner now, everyone? This food is all too delicious, and I am starving!"

They settle back to their plates, conversations breaking out all over the group. Peggy turns to say something to Frankie, and it's real sweet that she's making an effort there, fake relationship or not. Frankie hasn't been quite right since the war, and he wasn't the easiest fella before that, truth be told. It's only when she reaches for the salad bowl that Angie thinks to look down the table again, this time catching Ciara's eye.

Ciara looks something like devastated, and for the life of her Angie can't work out why at first. Then she realizes that it must be something to do with that little public display, given how hurt Ciara looks when she bows her head. Well, it seems the first girl Angie ever kissed thought they might be having a little Italian reunion. 

Angie's almost caught up in the idea, too, but then Peggy is reaching for her hand again even as she twirls some pasta on her plate with the other one. Fake or not, it focuses Angie's attention all over again. They're on a secret mission for this whole trip, and whatever happens, Peggy Carter won't be barred from the US of A on account of Angie doing anything to screw it up.

Now she just has to work out how a girl avoids getting her heart broken in the process.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peggy and Angie go exploring, and it's amazing who you can bump into in Brescia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hover over the Italian for English, as required. A million thanks to the lovely @ellaofravenclaw for getting good Italian out of my clumsy attempts at making 'translatable' English.

As dinner progresses, a feast of plenty that Angie knows can't be easy in this post-war climate, she's relieved to get caught up in conversation with her Uncle Giovanni, an amateur opera singer who actually gets the whole acting thing up to a point. It's easier not to think about Peggy when her brain is engaged in Italian, so Angie lets rarely-used words flow to discuss rehearsing and auditions and the whole Broadway mythos that Giovanni is way more enthused about than she has been in recent months of rejection after rejection.

Soon people are dispersing into other rooms, into the garden. Some of the non-relatives start making their excuses and disappear in a flurry of kisses. Angie tries to volunteer to help with dishes, but she's two aunts and three cousins too late. There'll be plenty of chances. 

"Angela," Nonna calls to her, still proudly at the head of the table. "Come, bella." Nonna never did pick up much English in the years she spent in the States with them, helping Ma and Papa raise Angie and Frankie, at least until an Allied bomb had killed Papa's oldest sister and her husband, leaving their three children orphaned. Nonna had sailed back heartbroken but determined to do right by those three grandchildren, and Angie hasn't seen her since that day at the docks Though there have been letters and cards filled with novenas and recipes that Angie keeps in a box under her bed.

"Nonna." Angie lets herself be drawn into the hug, even though she's too tall and probably too heavy now for Nonna's lap.

"Sei felice, tesoro?"

“Non t'importa? So che sarebbe meglio se mi piacessero gli uomini..."

"Solo i fascisti insegnano alla gente come si vive," Nonna warns, miming a spit and curse combination that Angie's missed more than she realized. Nonna uses it for everything from discussing illness of a neighbor to chasing away the monsters Angie used to think were waiting for her in the closet. "Anch'io amato un inglese. Una volta... prima di conoscere tuo nonno."

"Nonna!" Angie squeals at another glimmer of family scandal. "Sono sicura che a Peggy piacerebbe parlarti. Posso tradurre io."

"I understand," Nonna assures her. "Ma la tua signorina e' gia' andata in giardino, eh? Vai a riprenderla invece di dar retta a questa povera vecchia."

“Sei emozionata per tua la festa di compleanno?" Angela asks. "Sarai regina per un giorno. O forse per una settimana intera."

“Troppe smancerie," Nonna groans, but her grin is brief and wicked. "Forse mi merito di essere una regina. Gli ho pulito il sedere per anni e anni... anche a te, Angela."

“Okay, vado a cercare Peggy." Angie teases, kissing her Nonna on both cheeks and standing again. "Oh hey, Ciara."

"Little Angie Martinelli," Ciara murmurs, linking her arm with Angie's and steering her towards the front door and the small garden that everyone else has ignored in favor of the much larger space out back. "I can't believe the girl who taught me how to kiss is getting married."

"Uh, you taught me," Angie corrects, glancing around for any family members who might be collecting mocking material. "And, if I remember rightly, you told me it was just practice because you don't swing that way."

"Sometimes a pendulum gets stuck in one direction, Ang," Ciara explains. "It seemed safer, with my father and all."

"Oh yeah," Angie's memories of him were vague, a tall and broad man who always kept a neat but bushy beard. She remembers thinking his eyes weren't kind. What she hasn't forgotten though is the way Ciara would shrink in on herself at the very mention of him. Angie can feel her trying not to do exactly that right now. "I'm sorry to hear he passed."

"Shot by an American," Ciara breathes. "I suppose you can see where they'd mistake him for a Fascist."

"It's great to see you," Angie blurts after an awkward silence descends. "Really, it is. I didn't know if you'd stay around here, thought you'd be off to Milano or Roma, you know?"

"So did I," Ciara agrees. "But Mamma needs me. And honestly, it kinds of suits me. Like really coming home, you know?"

"Brooklyn's home to me," Angie replies, although really it's Manhattan she thinks of first these days. Manhattan fills her days and her nights, with work and the Theater District, the girls at the Griffith, and Peggy more and more. This plan is feeling more and more like a suicide mission. "Well, it's how I go home, anyway. You know the difference, right?"

"You mean your head is turned by the bright lights, and you don't dare to admit it to your family?"

"It's just a train ride."

"So is Vienna, from here."

"Good to know, if I want a waltz."

"Angie, are you-"

"I should go find Peggy," Angie interrupts. "Can't leave her alone in a sea of Martinellis with no translator."

"She seems pretty capable to me. She's what, a telephone operator?"

"Pretty much, yeah. But all those people are talking to her in English. You have a good night, Ciara."

***

"There you are!" Angie looks more than a little relieved when she finds Peggy sitting on one of the hand-crafted benches arranged on the back porch. The workmanship really is first rate, and Peggy is almost inclined to ask which family member is responsible. She can't resist a little teasing first.

"I'm really fine here with my wine," Peggy insists. "I wouldn't want to keep you from any further kissing lessons."

"You heard that, huh?"

"Eavesdropping is one of my worst habits," Peggy tells her, being quite honest for a change. "But please, don't let me stand in the way of Ciara's education."

"You should have stuck around, heard the part where she was the teacher. And you just gave me the college course, uh, back there."

"You weren't bad yourself, Miss Martinelli," Peggy teases, and she's grateful for the low light to hide her blushes. She hasn't been this bad at keeping her guard up since, well, since Steve. "I rather think you might already have a postgraduate degree."

"Make room," Angie says, nudging Peggy's shoulder. Well, at least she isn't running off and hiding from the little scene they created at dinner. "You spin quite a yarn, English. You nearly had me convinced it really happened. You're not regretting coming with, are you?"

"Regretting?" Peggy is incredulous. "Angie, you're doing me a huge favor. As for your family, they couldn't have been kinder, truly. Although, in the interests of full disclosure, I should warn you that Frankie is a little suspicious."

"Of us?" Angie seems more confused than worried. "Oh wait, I get it. He reckons you're out of my league and he's trying to see if there's a chance for him..."

"Not exactly, but..."

"Is there?" Angie leaps back up from her seat beside Peggy. "Because I love my brother, pain in my ass though he is, but if you're thinking you can get something going with him on the side..."

“Angie!” Peggy protests, almost spilling her win. The last thing she wanted was to indicate any actual interest in the man. “That is the last thing on my mind. You, me, and our little plan is my sole focus until we’re safely back through Immigration. And if that threatens for a second the love and belonging you have in this family, well, I’ll walk back to London from here. We’ll say to hell with the whole cockamamie scheme.”

“Wow, you’re really not hot for Frankie, huh?”

“That’s one way of putting it.” Peggy half wishes that Angie would follow that thread of reasoning to its logical conclusion: if not the brother, then perhaps the sister. For real, and not the charade of migration requirements.

What if it’s no coincidence that Angie is the first person that came to Peggy’s mind when faking up a potentially sordid affair. The question is whether that’s one truth that Peggy can actually offer the girl. It almost seems unfair, with her doing this out of friendship. Why should Angie be compromised any further by Peggy’s dangerous lifestyle, simply because the thought of Ciara kissing Angie has spiked a jealousy that churns like escaped stomach acid.

Music spills out from the open windows then, the chatter that populates every corner falling silent as though commanded by a conductor’s baton. The voice is clear and strong, caressing the notes in turn without lingering or being showy. A baritone, judging by the range, and a fine one at that. Peggy realizes she’s hearing opera as it should be done, and she leans in to whisper to Angie, whose eyes have slipped closed in something like bliss.  
“We simply must get this record,” Peggy insists.  
“Ain’t no record, English. Every family’s got a singer like this, don’t they?”  
“I can assure you mine does not.”  
“Well, you can borrow Giovanni. For as long as we’re engaged, anyway.”  
“Most kind,” Peggy sighs, leaning back and letting her own eyes close, right after the last mouthful of wine in her glass. She must not, she tries to scold herself inwardly, get used to unusual, beautiful evenings like this.  
***  
Morning sneaks up all too quickly, and as though her internal clock has reverted to Greenwich Mean Time, Peggy is up with the lark. She leaves Angie to slumber on, washing in their small bathroom and marvelling all the while at the distinct lack of headache after the way the red wine had been flowing.  
She dresses quickly in the compact space, although she’s changed in front of Angie many times now it feels altogether too intimate after sharing a bed for the third time. Habits are formed from less, Peggy knows, and if she were tailing herself there would be a smirk over how little she had resisted that pattern forming. It’s only as she steps out in search of her sandals that a rap comes at the door.  
“Peggy?”  
“Andrea,” she opens the bedroom door quickly, her cheeks flushing slightly despite her completely innocent state. Angie’s father is holding a breakfast tray. “Is this for us?”  
“We wanted to welcome you to the immediate family,” he explains, nodding to Francesca who’s hovering impatiently beside his left arm. “It can get so lost in the bigger crowd, and I know you had a bit of a fuss from Frannie here over the sleeping arrangements yesterday…”  
“Not a problem,” Peggy assures him. “Only Angie hasn’t surfaced from the land of Nod yet, I’m afraid.”  
“Sure I have,” Angie announces from right behind her, having crossed the stone floor as silently as any cat. “Those eggs could wake me from the dead, never mind a regular sleep.”  
“Do you lovebirds have plans for the day?” Francesca asks, guiding Andrea and his tray into the room, motioning for him to set it on the bed. “We’re all heading to Bergamo to see some folks, so you don’t have to tag along if you don’t want to.”  
“You can give us a ride, though?” Angie asks, seizing on a piece of bruschetta and sighing happily at her first mouthful of fresh tomato and bread. “I thought I’d show Peg here a bit of Brescia don’t want her getting stir crazy up here in the mountains.”  
“This is hardly the mountains,” Andrea tells them. “Sure, there’s a view, but this is barely tickling the feet of the Alps.”  
Peggy thinks longingly for a moment of the files hidden in her case. Although the early morning sunshine and prospect of a hearty breakfast has tempered that longing considerably. Back at the Griffith, she’d be working before her head had fully left the pillow; here, she’s beginning to see the appeal of a little rest and relaxation.  
“I’m quite happy to do whatever you’d like, darling,” Peggy addresses Angie, but she feels the beaming smiles that simple comment draws from both parents. “We can walk down, if you’d like. We’re quite used to that in New York.”

“No need, no need,” Andrea assures them. “You girls can take the bikes out by the barn. Gets you around a lot quicker. You ride, Peggy?”

“Oh yes,” Peggy replies. She doesn’t add that she went straight from bicycles to tanks. “I did bring a little work with me on this trip, I confess. But there’ll be plenty of time for that.”

“Then Brescia it is,” Angie announces. “You gotta get some of this food before I inhale it all,” she adds, offering the plate to Peggy.

***

Brescia is what Papa calls his hometown, and he’s talked about it often enough over the years that Angie feels she already recognizes the buildings and the sloping, cobbled streets. Here the town has grown up organically around the Roman organizing, not the cookie cutter lines and boxes of New York’s more planned landscape. Here, it actually feels possible to get lost, and that’s kind of a thrill as far as Angie’s concerned.

She just hopes it’s enough for Peggy. Not that she’s some kind of snob, far from it. Even with that cut-glass accent and the nice clothes; the fancy makeup that you only get quite right when you’re born to a certain quality of things, Peggy can make anyone feel like a Rockefeller when she turns their attentions on them. It’s just that before New York, Peggy presumably spent her childhood knocking around London, and not for nothing is that on the top two list of places that Angie would give her right arm to see. Maybe one day, when she finally breaks on Broadway, they’ll send some limey producer over to beg her to reinterpret Shakespeare as only a red-blooded American can.

Yeah. Angie won’t hold her breath on that one.

“So I figure we tie our bikes up at the Palazzo, then if you want we can hit the stores? I don’t know if you really budgeted for shopping, but there’s no rations and stuff here like in other places.”

“That might be nice,” Peggy agrees, her eyes obscured behind dark glasses, but her smile seems perfectly genuine. “Or we can just explore.”

“Well, some stuff my dad told me to wait so he can really show us around. I think that’s more where he used to get in trouble as a kid, though.”

“Perhaps I’ll pick up some Italian?”

“You know, for a phone gal,” Angie points out, trying not to emphasize the air quotes around that little job title. “You don’t have much of an ear for languages.”

Peggy laughs, throaty and genuine.

“Not the Romantic ones, no,” she admits. “French was always a war of attrition for me, something we learned out of duty to the nearest neighbors I suppose. All the better to understand when they’re insulting us.”

“Well, at least you got one,” Angie says, trying to be encouraging.

“Yes,” Peggy says breezily. “Plus, with all the uh, field hospital duties, I think I might just be able to scrape up a little German and Russian too.”

Angie fixes her with a look.

“What? You don’t think some Germans might have relocated here during the war?” Peggy asks, her innocence nearly as transparent as the windows of the café in front of them. There it is again, that tingling behind Angie’s nose that suggests she’s on to something, but she can’t quite get a grip on it. It’s possible Peggy’s some kind of British spy, but then surely her paperwork would be fixed by government suits, right? Not to mention why in the heck a Brit would be spying on her biggest ally. Angie’s not one to bring it up, but everybody knows Buckingham Palace would be home to a bunch of Germans by now if the cavalry hadn’t shown up.

“Let’s not go looking for trouble, huh? In case you hadn’t noticed, trouble finds us just fine by itself.”

“Good point. What else does this… Piazza have hidden away in its corners, then?”

Angie figures that they can always repeat things with her parents another day. Right now she just wants to bring a hundred stories and lovingly-shared memories to life. With a glance at the map she decides on a plan of attack.

“You can’t do Italy without some Roman ruins, English.”

***

Frequent stops at the fountains and a lunchtime sandwich with icy-cold lemonade has fortified them, but by the time they traipse out of one of the Duomos, which Angie promises is mere moments from their bikes, Peggy is famished. She’d give her eye teeth for a little gelato at this stage, or even a sip of fine Italian coffee.

“We can stop here,” Angie suggests, gesturing to a hotel awning in front of them. There’s something of a patio under it, and Peggy thinks she can hear her feet sighing in relief. Angie is harder to keep up with than Russian spies; at least they tend to lurk in shadows and generally remain indoors as much as possible. Invigorated by the connection to her roots, no doubt, Angie is a force of nature. Despite the tiring day spent trailing in and out of churches and even a castle in the grand European tradition, Peggy finds she wouldn’t have missed a moment of it. Perhaps a vacation has been more overdue than she realized.

“It’s so nice not to be the one waiting tables,” Angie groans, collapsing into a wooden seat at the first free table for two. “You gonna stand there all day?”

“Of course not,” Peggy sighs, sinking into the chair opposite. Something is making her spine tingle just slightly, that heightened awareness she never entirely manages to switch off making itself known. A side effect of tiredness she assumes, until Angie’s happy smile contorts into a frown at something over Peggy’s shoulder. 

“You invite your friend along?” Angie asks, the question snapped out.

“Howard?” Peggy asks, without turning around. It would be so like him to crash the party. She should have lied and said Rome. 

“Nah,” Angie corrects, her look beyond Peggy now definitely a glare. “Mr. Fancy, with a freshly-pressed suit. He doesn’t look half bad, for someone who traveled as far as we did.”

“Mr. Jarvis?” Peggy yelps, twisting sharply in her chair. Sure enough, he’s taking his bags out of a car, pausing only to smile shyly at her and offer a chummy little wave. Peggy has half a mind to stride over their and cause him some serious dental damage, but the spine-prickling feeling is telling her to be glad of an ally, however unexpected.

“Miss Carter,” he greets her, once a bellhop has taken his trunk and bags into the cool shadows of the hotel foyer. “I do hope you won’t mind this little imposition. Miss Martinelli.”

“What on earth are you doing here?” Peggy blurts, determined not to waste a second on niceties. 

“Well,” Jarvis begins, but they suffer yet further interruption when Angie leaps right back out of her seat.

“Frankie? Are you following us?”

“Hey!” Frankie holds his hands up in a display of innocence. “I got my own plans. It’s not such a big town, if you’re playing tourist. Besides, we gotta get back for dinner soon. Who’s this, Peggy? I hope you’re not breaking my little sister’s heart over some fella.”

“Fella?” Jarvis snorts.

“Another Brit, too. Fancy that, Angie. She had a husband stashed in Europe the whole time, huh?”

“He’s not my husband, you idiot,” Peggy snaps. “He’s my brother. Brother, dearest, I’d like you to meet Frankie. My future brother-in-law. If he survives the wedding, that is.”

“I’m… right. Well. Of course. Edwin J- Carter. Edwin Carter, at your service.”

“My what now?” Frankie asks as they shake hands, the requisite posturing playing out on either side. 

“Pleased to make your acquaintance. If you’re anything like Angela here, I’m sure we’ll all get along famously.”

“You know Angie too?”

“Of course,” Angie jumps in to steer the HMS Crazy back on track, before poor Mr. Jarvis can wreck the whole charade. “Edwin here has been in New York for a while, but he came back to London just a few weeks ago. When Peggy called about our trip he said he’d be coming this way anyway, didn’t you?”

“Right,” Jarvis confirms. “I travel a great deal, you see. It’s a pleasure to cross paths with my big-” Peggy stamps on his foot. “Little sister.”

“You’ll have to come by for dinner tonight,” Frankie insists. “I got the truck, if you girls want to throw your bikes in back.”

“I wouldn’t want to-”

“It’s no trouble.” Frankie knows he’s on to something, and his grin is all the more infuriating for it. “Ma and Papa will be just thrilled that Peggy’s got some family after all.”

“Dinner, then,” Peggy agrees, managing to stifle a groan. She just needs to get some time with Jarvis between now and then, or the whole trip will be a bust on the second day.

***


	5. Chapter 5

Angie braces herself as something - hopefully not someone - makes impact with the closed barn door that she’s guarding. 

She’ll say this for Peggy Carter, if she’s dishing out a tongue-lashing in there to Mr. Fancy, then she hasn’t raised her voice to a level that Angie can hear. That right there is some serious self-control, when Angie herself already feels like yelling _Get the hell outta here_ and _Can’t I get one freakin’ week of Peggy being my girl?_ Because Peggy can deny it all she wants, but a fella doesn’t hop the Atlantic for you unless he’s way more than sweet on you. Poor fool probably thinks he’s here to break up a real engagement, and that’s the one part giving Angie any satisfaction.

Frankie, thank God, has been spirited away by Ma. Better for his health, because Angie’s starting to take some real exception to the way he’s smirking at Peggy and thinking he’s got all the angles figured out. Maybe Angie isn’t one for bringing home someone who’s practically royalty, but it’s not like Frankie is either. There’s no reason for him to do anything but take her word, and given what it’s cost Angie over the years to be totally honest, new marriage laws or not, he’s got a damn cheek mistrusting her now.

“Everything all right in there?” Angie yells when it’s been silent a few minutes too long. “English? English-es?”

“We’re just fine, Miss Martinelli,” Fancy informs her, walking around the corner. His tie is a little crooked and his hair looks like he just had to wet it to calm it down, but otherwise he looks pretty much the same as he went in. “Miss Carter would like a word, in there. If it’s not too much trouble.”

It takes all of Angie’s self-restraint not to curtsy. How does this dandy have that effect on her? 

“Hey,” she calls out, entering the barn with a kind of casual spring in her step that’s the best acting performance of her career so far. “How’s that brotherly love?”

“If Mr. Jarvis hasn’t apologized to you already, please, let me do so,” Peggy begins. She’s leaning against the support column in the middle of the floor, looking for all the world like a wallflower at the dance. Even the way her legs are crossed at the ankle seems sort of wistful, as though someone just needs to ask her for a turn around the floor and set her free. “If this compromises you any further, Angie, I can change the plan and head to London tomorrow. I can’t bear the thought of ruining this once-in-a-lifetime trip for you and your family.”

“Is that his plan? Get you back to London where you might see sense and settle down? Did he follow you to New York in the first place, huh? That old flame that never quite flickers out.”

“Angela Martinelli, you sound positively jealous.”

“Yeah, well I went out on a shaky limb here, English. Five minutes after a fella shows up and you’re ready to flee for the home fires. What am I supposed to think?”

“I know I’ve told you this before, and really I hope this little performance is for eavesdropping Italian field mice,” Peggy is snappish now, her eyes darker than Angie ever remembers them being. “I am not romantically involved with that man. I am not now, and I never have been. He is a business associate, and his presence here is related solely to that.”

“Then it ain’t telephone business,” Angie snaps right back. “So why don’t you just come out with it once and for all, Peggy Carter? Who are you really? Because if you think you can use me to spy on America for some shady Commie-”

For a moment Angie thinks Peggy honestly might slap her. Somewhere in the exchange of words, Angie’s marched right up to her, and there’s swinging distance enough for Peggy to let fly and really connect. Angie would know, she’s slapped more than a few people in her time. 

“I am not a Communist,” Peggy spits the words like they’re sullying her mouth just by passing through it. “And to say that I would betray America, that I would betray …” She swallows real hard then, whether to stop herself from crying or just to stop herself giving away a secret, Angie can’t be sure. “You have no idea just how deeply you insult me, and the memory of those I loved, by even suggesting it.”

“Hey!” Angie holds up her hands in surrender, trying not to notice how Peggy’s chest is heaving with the deep breaths she’s taking, or that those painted red lips are yet again close enough to kiss. “Okay, okay. I take it back. But before we go in there and add another ring to this onion of tall tales, I want to know we’re at least being truthful with each other. I think I’ve earned that.”

“You’re right,” Peggy admits. “And your suspicions are not entirely unfounded. You’re only wrong about the side I’m working for. I don’t suppose I have to tell you this is one secret, above all other secrets, that must be kept?”

Peggy reaches out, laying trembling fingers of one hand on Angie’s cheek. “We’re talking life and death here. I’m not being dramatic.”

“You can count on me, you gotta know that by now,” Angie is earnest, clasping Peggy’s wrist and squeezing gently. “You don’t know what’s hit you this past few days, do ya? I’ve been so worried about my family and keeping my own ass out of jail that I never considered even you, cool as a cucumber, might be struggling.”

“It’s a lot easier with you in my corner,” Peggy admits, closing her eyes for a long moment. “I rather think I’d be lucky to marry you, Angie. Not that I could steal you off the market for real, of course. It wouldn’t be fair of me, now would it?”

“Of course,” Angie mutters as Peggy retreats, her implacable mask sliding back into place like a mime. “Now, do we have our stories straight for dinner? I assume the Prince of Wales out there is staying for food?”

“I think Frankie already announced him,” Peggy admits apologetically. “Here, take my hand. We both look a little flushed after that little contretemps, so hopefully people will assume we’ve been stealing a romantic moment and not pry too much. I’ve told Mr… Edwin, what role he’s playing tonight. My older brother, flew in the war, all that sort of thing. Follow my lead.”

“I always do, don’t I?” Angie asks, letting Peggy lead her by the hand back towards the house. “Besides, a great actress has to know how to ad-lib, don’t you know?”

“This is why I’m more convinced than ever that I’ll be seeing your name in lights, darling,” Peggy says with that devastating affection she usually keeps in reserve, and Angie’s breath catches in her throat before she mentally kicks herself into remembering that this is all for show. Sure enough, Ma was lurking just inside the kitchen, and her beaming smile says she overheard Peggy’s compliment. “Francesca, hello.”

“You girls had a nice time in town?” Angie’s mother asks, pulling them both into a hug. Peggy almost pulls her hand away, but Angie holds on. A moment more, that’s all she asks. Like Ma is congratulating them on something real. Angie closes her eyes and lets the warm feeling in her chest linger for a moment. 

“It was just like Papa promised,” Angie tells her, finally relinquishing Peggy as soon as Ma sets them free. “We didn’t explore too much, I know he wants to show us the real sights, tell us all the stories.”

“He’s bursting to,” Ma admits. “All day today, even with cousins who don’t know you from their other third-cousin-once-removed, he was babbling on and on about showing you and Frankie your heritage, wanting to see you kicking down the same streets he ran as a boy. This means a lot to him.”

“No wonder,” Peggy chimes in. “It’s a beautiful place. I was thoroughly charmed, but I can’t wait for the expert guide. Unless of course you’d rather just family. I can find something to occupy myself, I’m quite sure.”

“No, no!” Ma protests. “We wouldn’t hear of it. You’re family now, huh? Didn’t we tell you that already? And what’s this I hear about your brother showing up today? Now that’s a good brother. Hears his little sister is meeting the in-laws and shows up to represent you. It must mean a lot, your folks being gone and all.”

“Yes.” Peggy isn’t as expansive as usual, her smile brief and tight again. Angie bites back the urge to go take her hand again and tell her it’s going to be okay. This is Peggy, or whatever her name is, super-spy after all. A real Mata Hari in their midst, and Angie can’t tell a living soul. “Speaking of dear Edwin, I should perhaps go and find him. Make the introductions before we all sit to dinner.”

“It’s less crazy tonight,” Papa announces, walking in from the garden with a couple of dusty green bottles in each hand. “He seems a stand up gentleman, your brother.”

“He is,” Peggy agrees. “Angie, can I steal you as my interpreter one more time? I doubt Edwin has any more command of the tongue than I have. Unless Latin counts for much?”

“Duty calls,” Angie says, grinning at her parents. As long as they see her happy, they won’t ask too many questions. “Let’s go save ol’ Eddie, huh?”

They find him at last in the sitting room, in the chair at Nonna’s right hand side, sipping something from a china cup and chatting politely in fluent Italian. Angie can’t quite smother her laugh in time, at the way Peggy’s sails so clearly have the wind sucked out of them.

“Italian, darling brother?” Peggy interrupts at the first ebb in conversation. “You’re quite the dark horse.”

“It’s merely a hop, skip, and a jump once you master some Spanish and a little Greek,” Fancy admits with false modesty. “I’ve just been hearing about how charmed the whole family are with you Mi- Peggy. Peg?”

“Dinner won’t be long!” Andrea calls from the kitchen. Angie decides the English can fend for themselves a while longer, and slips out of the room to go freshen up.

***

The numbers are considerably less tonight, Peggy notes with some relief. She makes sure to ensconce herself on the opposite side of the table to Frankie, as far as she can manage. Jarvis takes a seat to her right without having to be told, and Angie redirects Giovanni so she can take the other seat at Peggy’s left. There’s an appetizer of artichokes making its way around the table, and she can only hope her stomach’s traitorous rumble is disguised by the chatter and laughter in the room.

“So,” Andrea announces once everyone is seated, apart from him at the head of the table. “We’re joined by a new guest tonight, Edwin Carter. Fresh from London.”

A murmur of welcome goes up in English and Italian alike, but the passing of the bread baskets seems to be taking precedence. 

“In fact, Edwin’s arrival seems to me to be a sign from God himself, confirmation of a crazy idea I’ve had ever since we found out about Peggy and this little engagement last week. Angie, forgive your crazy father, but your Nonna and I, we have a proposition for both of you.”

“I already got my proposal, Papa,” Angie wisecracks in Italian, getting a giggle from her aunts and uncles. She translates in a murmur for Peggy’s benefit, but she already got the gist. 

“Girls,” Andrea seems to be choked up already. 

Peggy feels her stomach sink. Anything this emotional is going to be a massive disruption. She’s already panicking in the back of her mind about finally admitting her spying proclivities to Angie, even without mention of Steve or Howard, or any of the other salacious details that would turn the whole tale into something of a comic book. 

“I hope we haven’t upset you,” she offers, reaching for her wine.

“Quite the opposite. To have you both here in this place that means so much to me, I can’t express it very well,” Andrea admits, laying his open palm over his heart. “Just further up the mountain road from here is the church where I was baptized. Where my parents married. Where I wished I had the money to bring your Mamma; Angie, Frankie, I’ve told you this often enough. I would have given anything to marry her there.”

Peggy sees where this is going, but an objection simply won’t form.

“We know you probably had some stylish New York ceremony planned,” Francesca takes over, squeezing her husband’s arm as he takes his seat. “But it’s all legal here now, too. And if you’d let us, we’d love to give you a beautiful wedding right here. It means Nonna can see you married, too, Angela. We don’t want to pressure you, but it would be our gift to you. All you’d have to do is show up and look beautiful.”

“Here,” Nonna says, rising from her seat and shuffling around to stand beside Angie’s seat. She pulls a gold ring with a modest but gorgeous diamond trio from her wedding finger, and presents it to her granddaughter. “Do it right,” she commands. 

Angie looks at the ring in the palm of her hand, then turns slightly and looks up at Peggy. She’s stunned, the poor girl, and Peggy feels absolutely wretched at wasting all this glorious sentiment and deep, abiding familial love on a ruse. The wretchedness reaches its nadir as Nonna places her hands on each of their shoulders. 

“Peggy,” Angie licks her lips, rolling her neck like a boxer stepping into the ring. “I don’t want to pressure you either, but now Ma and Papa have said it, I can’t think of a better way to marry you. I really can’t. I understand if you want to wait, but something about all this Italian air is going straight to my head. And I never did get you a ring. I guess a family heirloom makes it pretty official, wouldn’t you say?”

“Angie,” Peggy chokes on the word, her hand fluttering to cover her mouth in embarrassment. Everyone awww-s at the apparent display of emotion. “I don’t know if I can-”

“This is what I want,” Angie leans into whisper. “An actual wedding solves all your problems at once. We’d be home free.”

“I really don’t know what to say,” Peggy is quite honest, speaking in her normal voice for everyone else’s benefit. “Nonna, Andrea, Francesca… your generosity is so overwhelming, I… yes. If this is what Angie wants, then it’s absolutely what I want. We accept. And Angie? That’s a yes, in case you were wondering.”

Oh, for a moment the eruption of joy is something to be savored. Peggy accepts Angie’s arms thrown around her neck, and the cheers chase away the doubts of a bad idea done in haste. It really does solve all her problems, but Peggy doesn’t want Angie living the rest of her life as a divorcée just to do her a favor.

Only then Angie pulls back just enough to slip the ring on Peggy’s finger, and by some trick of fate it fits perfectly, as though the jeweler had sized it for her just that day. Peggy looks down at the sparkling stone, then back up at the seemingly genuine happiness on Angie’s face. If she’s acting, she truly is a force of nature. In the heat of the thing, it’s simply too irresistible. Peggy’s spent many lonely nights pretending to be a nurse, an assassin, a secretary working overtime, or a scarlet woman in a nightclub. Tonight, just for a little while, she can play the woman she never dared to hope she’d be: a woman someone would want to be their wife. 

It’s that last thought that leads her to kiss Angie, not the point-proving exercise of the previous night, but a moment of genuine affection that Peggy has no hope of trying to contain. They might be skirting a dangerous edge now, but even Frankie has joined in the celebrating, pouring wine into every glass that comes his way.

“It’s gonna be fine,” Angie murmurs against her lips. “We’ll talk after dinner, okay?”

“Well,” Jarvis says after Peggy turns back around properly, to start helping herself to dinner. “It seems I’ve shown up just in time, Miss Carter.”

“Peggy,” she hisses. She’ll deal with Jarvis and his mission in the morning. For now, nothing is going to spoil Angie’s night. Peggy will start shooting to make sure of it, if she has to.


	6. Chapter 6

“Do I get to ask what Fancy is actually doing here?” Angie asks, leaning against the bedroom door that she’s just closed. The house is mostly quiet now, and they’re both a little worse for wear on that really delicious red that’s been flowing since dinner started. “I mean, so I can cover for you or whatever.”

“I can’t share particulars, I’m afraid.”

“National security?”

“Something like that.”

“I really can sleep on the floor, you know.” Angie can’t believe she’s actually sabotaging herself like this, but she knows what just happened has to be scaring the pants off Peggy. “That was a lot, back there. I’d understand if you want me to go sleep in the barn. I mean, getting married to me? Wow.”

“You should probably…” Peggy bites her lip, in the midst of kicking off her shoes. That only leaves the dress and her makeup, and Angie can see the hesitation about removing either. “I want to rid you of this idea that pretending to be in love with you is a hardship, Angie.” Peggy jerks her head to indicate her zipper, and Angie steps up to oblige. 

“Hey, I’m not the kind of gal that-”

“Nonsense,” Peggy assures her. “Any spy would be proud to come in from the cold to you. I’m just sorry all this familial love and sense of occasion is being wasted on me. It should be saved for someone you truly love, after all.”

Angie sees her chance, as clear as day. She takes a deep breath, lowers Peggy’s zipper, and lies through her teeth. “It’s fine. Nonna’s only going to have one 90th birthday, so at least I can give her this. I hate to say it, I hope she lives another 30 years, but if she never knows no better, well. That’s not the worst, is it?”

“It’s a beautiful ring,” Peggy whispers, holding her hand up for a moment, letting the light catch the stones. Her dress is pooled around her ankles, just a camisole and underskirt protecting her pale skin from Angie’s gaze. “For a moment, I confess, I-”

A knock at the door. Angie curses in both languages, and pulls a robe from the hook for Peggy. When it’s in place, Angie opens the door to see none other than Fancy. 

“I had departed for the hotel,” he says apologetically. “But we didn’t fix a time for tomorrow.”

“Seven,” Peggy snaps, barely looking at him. “I was just going to arrange it with Angie, in fact.”

“Good, then. See you tomorrow. Miss Carter. Miss Martinelli.”

“What’s tomorrow?” Angie asks the minute the door is closed. “I’m all for keeping your secrets but you can’t just run off anywhere you like, Peg.”

“Let’s finish changing, shall we? I must get this paint off my face or I think I’ll scream,” Peggy tells her. “Meet you in bed?”

“Sure,” Angie agrees, easy and breezy because it’s easier than anything else right now. 

***

Peggy is rubbing some lotion into her hands as she watches Angie approach. It’s time to give the girl a little something concrete, that much is certain. If for no other reason than they need all possible room in their heads for all the other lies they have to tell this week.

“The reason Mr. Jarvis has come calling is related to something I was working on back in New York. Some items, dangerous items, were stolen. Most of those have been recovered, but it seems they were gone long enough for some copies to be made. Less stable ones, at that, and in the hands of some very unsavory characters.”

“Are my family in danger?” Angie asks right away, and Peggy feels her heart swell a little at that fierce devotion. It’s something a girl could get used to if she’s not careful, and that would simply never do. 

“At the moment, no. But we have reason to believe Mussolini’s old base at some lake or other has been repurposed by these unsavory characters. If you can excuse me for the day, Mr. Jarvis and I will attend to matters there and hopefully be back by dinner.”

“Well, you better make room for me in Fancy’s car,” Angie decides after a minute.

“Angie, no-”

“My family will think it’s mighty strange you tramping off into the Italian countryside, what with both of you being tourists and all. No way you make it out of this house without someone volunteering to play guide, at the very least.”

“That is quite inconvenient,” Peggy declares, nagging thoughts of Colleen rising in her thoughts, regardless of how hard she tries to tamp them down. Danger by proximity is one thing, but to actually drive Angie into the lion’s den is unthinkable. It would be wrong even with someone far more trained, but the thought of some Leviathan goon pointing a pistol at Angie has Peggy close to vomiting at the mere imagining of it. “I don’t suppose it’s worth pointing out that you’ve never actually been here before and your guiding is based on your father’s memories?”

“That and my street smarts,” Angie adds with a grin. “English, I’m not one of those that does a favor and says what have you done for me lately? But I figure if I’m gonna marry you, I should get in on some of the excitement. The acting practice alone, c’mon…”

“If it maintains our cover here, then I suppose you can come along,” Peggy sighs, reaching for the switch on the lamp. “But Angie? You are absolutely staying in the car. Understood?”

“Sure,” Angie answers, snuggling down under the covers. The speed of her answer suggests that no, she doesn’t understand at all.

***

“Miss Martinelli,” Fancy greets her as she stumbles, still half-asleep but dressed for adventure, into Nonna’s kitchen. “Am I to assume you’ll be joining us on our excursion? I spoke with your grandmother a little while ago, and she insisted we prepare some snacks.”

“She does that. If Nonna had her way we’d travel with snacks from the kitchen to the dining room, just in case.”

“If I were as talented in the kitchen, I would surely foist it on everyone too,” he says, and despite the snooty accent, a little smile suggests his affection for Nonna is genuine. Angie feels her warming just a fraction of a degree to the guy for that. 

“So Eddie, huh? Gonna take a while to get used to that,” Angie admits. “Peg should be out in a minute. I think she’s trying to get some secret stuff out of her suitcase without me seeing.”

“I fear Miss Carter underestimates you.”

“I fear neither one of you understands the need for discretion,” Peggy interjects from the doorway. “Are we okay to leave without some sort of mass farewell?”

“Yeah, I told Ma on my way here,” Angie updates them, feeling more awake at the sight of Peggy, dressed for a summer day in Italy but hauling an army-issue duffel bag on her shoulder. “You got your car out back, Eddie?”

“This way, ladies,” Fancy holds the door open like they’re arriving for high tea at the Plaza.

“This is the car?” Peggy confirms, looking at a sweeter than hell Rolls Royce. “Mr. Jarvis, who have you been calling in favors from?”

“A gentleman never divulges.”

“Angie,” Peggy turns to her. “This is the car. As you can see it’s quite comfortable. Which is convenient, really, given that you will be staying in it the whole time we’re at our destination. Don’t worry, we’ll roll down the windows for you.”

Angie scowls at the patronizing, but she can see a ghost of a smile playing across Peggy’s red-painted lips. Fine. Let her think Angie plays by the rules. If she doesn’t know better by now, that can’t exactly be Angie’s fault, now, can it?

***

“What excuse did you give your mother?” Peggy asks, turning to talk to Angie in the back. “I assume you got us a day pass?”

“Yeah, I told her your brother here had suggested you go look up some cousin who moved out this way before the war. There wouldn’t be time to write them, but you could maybe bring them to the wedding. Not that you will, of course, because there won’t be any cousin. But you know, we don’t have to find them, do we?”

“That’s quite impressive. I was worried you’d sign me up for a day of fake shopping.”

“Well, there’s shopping in your future. Unless you brought a wedding dress in your luggage,” Angie points out. “You know, along with the gun and those files in Russian or whatever it is.”

“Angie Martinelli, you are a snoop!” Peggy looks both outraged and impressed, and even Fancy meets Angie’s eye in the rearview mirror. 

“Seems to me if you’re gonna hide things, you should find better hiding places.”

“I believe she has a point,” Fancy agrees, and he’s definitely fighting a smile on that wax-perfect face of his. Angie’s beginning to think that a sidekick isn’t the worst idea she’s ever had. “Who’s playing navigator? I do hope that map is up to date, but it was the only one the concierge had to spare.”

“I’m a perfectly good navigator,” Peggy snaps, retreating back into the passenger seat fully and fixing her gaze on the road ahead. “A map is merely a bonus, Mr. Jarvis.”

“If she gets you lost, I can talk to the locals, Eddie. You got the lingo, but you sure don’t got the accent.”

“Thank you for the offer,” Fancy tells her. “Did you want something to read for the rest of the trip? I have a Joyce novel in my bag that might while away some time.”

“No need,” Angie replies. “Don’t you know a Martinelli can sleep anywhere?”

A few minutes later, both women have drifted off without speaking another word. 

“Yes,” Angie hears Fancy say just before she succumbs to the pull of a good nap. “You two seem to have that in common.”

***

“It’s a lake,” Angie repeats for the third time, kicking up stones as she paces the little parking area they’ve found. “I can’t believe you don’t want me going swimming. It’s a _lake_.”

“I warned you that this work would be dull. Also, that you have to stay with the car, Angie.”

“Won’t it look weird that we drove all the way to this picture postcard of a lake and I’m not going for a splash?” Angie looks to Jarvis for yet more backup, but Peggy shoots him a warning glare of her own, and he wisely keeps his trap shut.

“If all goes well, perhaps we’ll make time for a swim before heading back,” Peggy lies. “I really would feel better if we left you somewhere more populated.”

“Either I’m your getaway driver or I’m not, English.” 

“Actually, I’d prefer no one drove the car but me,” Jarvis intercedes, competing for a spot on Angie’s list. It’s not a list Peggy relishes being on either, so she’ll step aside and let him talk his way into the top slot. “But perhaps a spot of paddling wouldn’t draw too much attention? It might be kinder than making Miss Martinelli wait in the car on a day that promises to be something of a scorcher.

“Fine,” Peggy snaps, not at all happy that she’s the point on this triangle without an alliance. “Just be ready to make a sharp exit it, should it be required.”

“You say the sweetest things,” Angie groans. “Go save the world, or whatever. And if those Commies have a stash of cold lemonade, well. That couldn’t hurt.”

***

Angie’s feet are getting a little numb when she hears the shout. 

Paddling isn’t much fun when you’re waiting to be ambushed who God knows who, and Angie’s never been much of one for her own company. She could have moved from her parents’ house to a little studio somewhere, or got a single roommate she never saw, but the Griffith with its constant stream of company had been the obvious choice the moment she heard of it. The fact that the turnover of girls refreshed so often only sealed the deal.

That first shout is followed by something like a yelp, and Angie splashes her way back to shore. She uses a towel she found in the trunk to hastily dry her feet, and she’s shoving her second shoe back on when there’s a definite, unmistakable rat-a-tat-tat of gunfire. Her heart plummets at the thought that this hail of bullets might be directed at Peggy. Worse, that one might hit that beautiful body and leave her crumpled in the grass somewhere, Angie never to set eyes on her again.

The panic hits right as Fancy comes tearing into sight, Peggy hot on his heels. Angie fears for her life in that moment because they can’t hide the terror on their faces. 

“Car!” Peggy yells, waving frantically. Behind her, a goon with a gun appears. Angie knows that’s her cue to go gun the engine, but she doesn’t see anyone else in that moment and there’s a chance Peggy could be struck down while Angie goes to play race car driver. With those two stark choices, it isn’t even an option. Instead of bolting, Angie bends down and snatches a nice heavy stone from the loose ones around her feet.

Mr. Shooter doesn’t see it coming, hell, Angie doesn’t even know if he’s noticed her yet. He notices her improvised fastball though, because that damp piece of rock has just been served up to him. Hard, fast, and right between the eyes. It’s where Frankie always taught her to pitch to, at least the first throw out, so the guys would let his kid sister in the game. They’d been closer then, Angie realizes. That Frankie wouldn’t be trying to catch his sister’s girl in a lie.

“Angie!” Peggy squeaks, out of breath and staggering to a halt. “You can’t… I mean… well. _Well_.”

“Well,” Fancy echoes, looking at Angie even as he grabs his knees and takes some deep, huffing breaths.

“Are there more?” Angie demands, not one to dwell on a trick she’s been pretty great at since she was nine. “Because you kind of stopped short of the car, there.”

“Just one sentry left,” Peggy gasps. “You got him. He took my gun,” she remembers suddenly, jogging back to the prone guy and raiding him for weapons. The Peggy who walks back over is much less terrified and way more terrifying, laden down with two pistols, some kind of machine gun, and a _JesusMaryandJoseph_ Bowie knife between her teeth. When she smiles around it, it’s simultaneously the scariest and most attractive thing that Angie’s ever seen. She doesn’t know whether to genuflect or drag Peggy straight into the backseat, Fancy be damned.

“Did you at least get what you came for?” Angie is getting real tired of this piecemeal approach to information. They’ll be spilling on the way back, once they’ve fully caught their breath. Otherwise they’ll be getting a couple of fastballs of their own.

Fancy pats his blazer in confirmation. He then opens the door for her, and Angie could swear for a second he’s actually going to bow. Figures. Not like they have the Brooklyn Dodgers in jolly old England. Speaking of its other resident, Peggy is dumping her loot in the trunk, covering it up with what looks like a perfectly nice picnic blanket. 

“Do you want to ride up front, Angie?” Peggy asks, shaking out her hair. For a moment, it feels like there never was any danger. “We’re out of the woods for now.”

“What about tomorrow?” Angie asks, quite reasonably in her opinion. “Day after? Only we got a wedding to plan now, English. You think my temper’s something? You want to see Ma after you upset one of her parties.”

“It was a simple, but time sensitive mission,” Fancy supplies. “Trust us, Miss Martinelli. These actions today, including your own little improvisation, have kept us all safe for a good while to come. You can be very proud.”

Well, put it like that and Angie doesn’t mind so much after all. She scurries into the backseat, letting Peggy ride up front where she clearly belongs. She’s surprised to see Peggy climb in back right after her, minus the scary hardware. 

“It looks more comfortable back here,” is all Peggy says, when Fancy gives her a funny look in the rearview mirror. “Besides, it will look less strange when we get back to Nonna’s.”

“So long as we don’t bring any more trouble back with us,” Angie reminds them. “Let’s just get through this week without any more surprises, huh? Especially if that’s a bomb in your pocket, mister,” she teases. She really, really hoped for a better reaction than the way Fancy looks super pale and sweaty at the very mention. Maybe Angie will just start saying a Hail Mary every time the road gets bumpy, just in case.

“Trouble is quite literally behind us,” Peggy promises. Angie can’t help but smile when she reaches across and squeezes Angie’s hand to emphasize the point.

***

They make it back for dinner, which is impressive considering they stopped for lunch and lemonades at Angie’s insistence. Fancy actually makes for decent company when he relaxes a little bit, and the Italian sunshine and all the scenery that had them wide-eyed affected him almost as much. They’re all in high spirits when they pull up at the house, and Angie doesn’t think anything of it when Frankie comes swaggering out to meet them.

“Hey, Frankie.” She greets him with a punch to the arm. His fastball training really saved their bacon today, after all. “What’s cooking?”

“You know, Ang, if you were bringing a whole party for your girl here, you could have told Ma.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means first Eddie, now some broad has shown up looking for Peggy here. Don’t suppose you forgot to mention a sister, too?”

“No sister,” Peggy is just this side of snapping and Angie shoots her a little warning glance. No need to get right on the defensive, super spy or not. “Is she waiting inside?”

“In fact she is. Her employers actually paid for her to come visit you, isn’t that something? Of course, it turns out she works for INS and thinks this whole rinkydink engagement is a scam, but hey, it’s not like she’s the only one.

Angie sees red so fast she thinks Frankie might be the next one knocked out cold, but Peggy stops her with a firm grip of her upper arm. 

“She’s mistaken,” Peggy states, and the edge is not even slightly hidden this time. “Why don’t we go and remind Miss Underwood of that? It’s really too much, all this travel for little old me.”

“Why don’t we?” Frankie agrees. “This, I gotta see.”


	7. Chapter 7

“Miss. Underwood.” It is taking almost every last drop of Peggy’s reserve not to shoot the woman right then and there. She’s sitting at the head of the dinner table, her frosty demeanor banishing Angie’s family members to the far corners of the room where they gossip about her in fervent Italian whispers. If Miss Underwood is bothered by that, she makes no indication. Instead she writes steadily in her notebook, barely looking up even when Peggy addresses her.

Maddening. Absolutely, positively infuriating. 

“Miss Carter,” comes the Midwestern drawl that rings just a little off to Peggy’s ear. It’s taken her years to develop a familiarity with the nasal flatness and melodic drawls that pepper the 48 states, and even now it’s not as effortless as sorting her Glaswegian from her Gloucestershire. “I understand yet further congratulations are in order?”

“If you’ve said anything to upset these good people-”

“Peggy!” Andrea enters the room then, making right for her. He doesn’t look especially angry, but Peggy braces herself all the same. “You had a good time with your cousin?”

“Yes,” she answers. “Unfortunately he’s had some health troubles and won’t be able to attend, but it was delightful to see him. We gave him a real surprise.”

“Attend your wedding?” Underwood stands then, inserting herself in the conversation. “You didn’t mention that you’d be marrying before returning to the United States.”

“It was our idea,” Andrea rounds on her, his shoulders tensing beneath his blue shirt. “I told my girls that we’d be so honored to have them marry here in my home town. You got a problem with that, lady?”

“Papa-” Angie tries to head him off, but Peggy knows it’s futile with a parent on the defensive. At least, that’s her excuse. It has nothing to do with the lump in her throat at the way Andrea had claimed Peggy as his family in an instant, extending that shield of love and protection without a second thought. What generous, wonderful people she’d chosen to deceive. Now here came Dottie Underwood, the biggest threat to Peggy’s life after HYDRA, and it felt desperately unfair. The way it had felt when Mum and Dad hadn’t come home, when Grandma had made Peggy sweet tea and told her how God had plans, and how young ladies didn’t cry in public. 

“I’m afraid we’re keeping numbers small, Miss Underwood,” Peggy steps up to the man so willing to be her father-in-law, and lays a gentle hand on his forearm. “We shan’t have room for uninvited guests. Will you be needing a lift back into town?”

“I’ve made my own arrangements,” Dottie replies.

“I suppose you have, since the INS has very little in the way of jurisdiction here in Italy.”

“In special cases, the government is always willing to go the extra mile.”

“I’m sure. 4,000 extra does feel a tad like pushing it though,” Peggy responds with her most threatening smile. “Now, was there anything else?”

“No,” Dottie gathered her things, stuffing them into a purse that looked brand new. Perhaps her trip through Milan had been more indulgent than Peggy’s own. “My investigations will continue. Is this your brother?”

“Yes,” Peggy lies, nodding at Jarvis. “He’s a British citizen. Have you opened a branch office in London, too?”

“Things have gotten confused since the war,” Dottie informs her, a strange look on her face. “There must be a certain amount of order, Miss Carter. The United States cannot continue to open its doors to the world without the relevant limits and paperwork.”

It’s there again, that hint of a fractional slip on the vowels. Peggy registers it like the whisper of tinfoil on a filling and shakes her head. One mystery at a time. 

“If America had been more careful about limits, I think you’d find a lot more Native Americans and far fewer Underwoods on her shores,” Peggy points out. “Nonetheless, we’re making every effort to comply. I hope that’s being noted.”

“Of course. I do need to speak with your brother here, will you be driving back into town Mr. Carter?”

“Unless I’m required tonight… Peggy?”

It almost sounds completely natural. Peggy suspects Jarvis is beginning to relish having a role to play, the utter ham.

“I suppose you don’t have to be,” Peggy answers through gritted teeth. “Don’t let it inconvenience you, dear.”

“It’s really no trouble at all for my dearest sister and her future happiness. Of course, I’d rather you were at home in jolly old England with me, but both New York and Miss Martinelli have captured your heart.”

She shoots him a warning look. There’s no need to descend into a scene from Gilbert & Sullivan. 

“That’s it?” Frankie whines. “I thought we were gonna get the real story.”

“Francesco, you shut your mouth,” Andrea warns him, glowering at his only son. Peggy suspects this conflict might be rooted in more than the current standoff. “Miss Underwood, whatever you’re after, you won’t find it here in this family. We’re very happy that Angie has found her match, and if there’s any issues with Peggy’s citizenship, I’m happy to sponsor her or something. We did it plenty for the guys who work in my company. Out of thanks for what they did in the war, remember when we used to bother about things like that?”

“And Peggy served in the war,” Angie blurts. “She’s been an ally of America longer than you’ve been pushing paper, I reckon.”

“Angie,” Peggy warns. The last thing she wants is her heavily-redacted military record being looked at. She’ll have to hope that the SSR has been smart enough to have a ‘public’ version that presents her as a nurse or similar. “Please, darling. There’s no need to fight my corner.”

“She’ll shut up soon enough when we’re hitched,” Angie finishes, folding her arms over her chest in the most glorious little display of defiance. Just like earlier, stunned into silence by Angie’s unflappable and deadly aim, Peggy can feel that tugging sensation that suggests she could really fall here. Fall hard and fast and make an absolute idiot of herself, ruining a perfectly lovely friendship in the process. No. That simply will not do. 

“Edwin, if you could take care of Miss Underwood? Now, is there anything I can help with for dinner?” Peggy changes the subject and steers Angie back across the room towards the kitchen, not quite escaping Frankie’s glare. 

“It’s not so bad yet that we have to rely on you for cooking,” Andrea jokes from behind them, winking at Peggy. “Angie might have mentioned you’re a disaster in the kitchen. Back when we thought you gals were just pals, anyway.”

“I’ll have to get her to teach me,” Peggy says, responding to the generosity as best she can. She tries not to wonder how often the Martinellis have discussed her. How many of her domestic failings do they know, and still consider her a worthy partner regardless? They’re really quite baffling in their openness and lack of passive-aggression. Well, save for Frankie perhaps.

“Let’s go freshen up,” Angie decides, using Peggy’s holding of her hand to steer them now. “Sorry about the unexpected bossy boots, Papa.”

“It’s no trouble if it’s for you, Angela. You know that. Guess that goes double now I’m gonna have two daughters, huh?” He pulls them into a hug before Angie can lead them into the hall, and Peggy finds herself accepting quite readily, one arm around Angie’s shoulders and the other hand patting Andrea’s back in gratitude. “What’s a little paperwork to make a family?”

“Quite,” Peggy agrees, her chest tightening as the familiar urge to flee creeps up her spine. “We’ll see you at dinner, Andrea.”

“If it’s not too soon,” he urges, looking steadily at them both. “Then Peggy, you should call me ‘Papa’ too. Or Dad, if that’s a bit less Continental.”

“Oh,” Peggy feels real tears stinging at her eyes. It’s been eighteen years since she had cause to actually call someone by that name. “Papa will do just fine. Thank you.”

***

“I only hope Jarvis doesn’t say anything to blow this whole thing,” Peggy grumbles as Angie slams the door shut behind them. “I should have gone with him, shouldn’t I?”

“I feel sick,” Angie clutches her stomach as she leans against the dresser. She isn’t lying. She might hurl the afternoon’s lemonade right up on her shoes, and that would be a waste with them being her newest pair and all. 

“You do?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.” Peggy stands there useless for a moment, and Angie can feel a spike of anger stab through the nausea. “Is there anything I can…?”

“I haven’t been thinking straight at all,” Angie groans, closing her eyes to Peggy’s concern, and how much she needs Angie to come through for her this week. “I’ve been so intent on getting that little bit closer, at pretending you could ever… I forgot about them. No, that ain’t fair. I didn’t forget, but I pushed their feelings all the way down and told myself it’s just a game. Nobody needs to get hurt, nobody ever needs to find out this was all a lie for you and your job.”

“Angie-”

“No, English. You’re not going to make me forget again, so just keep that pretty mouth of yours shut for a minute. I need to protect them. I need to find a way to shield them when you’ve played house long enough to get a passport and usher me out like some understudy who really believed her leading lady was too ill to go on opening night.”

“Angie, please-”

“We can sell it a couple more days, okay? I think maybe we shouldn’t overdo it. You spend time with your fake brother, I’ll get busy with the cousins, and maybe they’ll think we’re just being good at family. We walk up the aisle whatever day Papa has arranged it all, and then we’re back on a plane and you’ll just let me know when there’s any paperwork to sign, okay?”

“Do you want me to leave?”

“I think the time for space was before you called him Papa, don’t you? This is gonna break all their hearts, and I’ll forever be the screw up failed actress kid who couldn’t keep that English dame they liked so much. But yeah, there’s good light so maybe you can go check on Fancy and his story. If you stay at the hotel, I’ll come up with a story.”

“Right.” Angie opened her eyes just in time to catch Peggy wiping away what might have been tears. Angie hadn’t heard even the slightest wobble in Peggy’s voice, but sure enough she’d been upset. “I’ll just take a small bag for tonight.”

“Whatever you think, English. I just don’t think I can stomach making goo-goo eyes over the beef tonight, at least.”

“Totally understandable. And Angie?” Peggy crosses the room then, abandoning the bag she’s putting together.

“Yeah?” Angie answers, trying not to tremble as Peggy reaches out and gently lifts her chin with her smooth, non-trembling fingers.

“If it’s too much I really will go back to London from here. There’s always another way.”

“I know,” Angie replies dully. “Just makes me the idiot who couldn’t follow through on her promise. By the time you ever make it back to America, you won’t even want to be my friend. Never mind the rest of it.”

Peggy looks pained at the very mention, and Angie could kick herself for not leaving it at ‘friend’. That’s the whole goddamned problem with this mess, and a night alone really can’t hurt when things are this sensitive. Angie’s whole body, hell, her soul even, feels like a big old bruise that she can’t stop poking. No matter how much it makes her want to yelp in pain. 

“After all this,” Peggy tells her, her fingers still warm against Angie’s skin. “You’ll never be anything less than my very best friend. Whatever you decide.”

There’s a moment, Angie is no stranger to the hesitating breath before a kiss, and this is one of those moments. It wouldn’t be their first, but there’s a heaviness in the air like it could be their last, and that’s enough to spook Angie into breaking eye contact first. Well, her eyes weren’t anywhere but staring at Peggy’s lips, and that was reason enough to force herself to look away.

Moment broken, Peggy goes back to shoving a few things in her smaller bag. Instead of brushing past Angie to get to the door, she makes her way to the window instead. Peggy’s easing herself out into the garden before Angie can even think to protest.

“English!”

“It’ll be easier if I just disappear for tonight, don’t you think?” Peggy gathers herself once she’s standing again, and Angie wouldn’t have to know her as well as she does to see the effort that goes into a pretty fake smile. “Send word in the morning if you want me back here. Otherwise I’ll be just fine in town with Mr. Jarvis.”

Angie wonders, suddenly, if she’s making a huge mistake. Anything that involves Peggy waving and fading into the evening sunlight can’t be the right choice, not in this or any other world. Angie’s a split-second from climbing out after her when Frankie waltzes in without bothering to knock.

“Made a break for the border, has she?” Frankie nods to the disturbed clothes Peggy didn’t take with her. Angie pushes past him with a shoulder to the ribs and gathers the things up.

“She needed to go ask her brother about something. She’ll be back,” Angie has never acted so hard in her life. She wants to burst into tears but she’s shrugging her shoulders like Kate Hepburn at her all-time coolest. Nothing to worry about, no show here today. No show without Punch, that’s something she’s heard Peggy say when she’s particularly exasperated about work, and Angie smiles to herself at the thought of it.

“I see she’s making her way into Papa’s good graces,” Frankie continues, sitting on the bed like he’s invited, like he’s even allowed. He’s munching on some piece of fruit he brought with him, and offers it to Angie like they’re still kids playing in the street and she’d share with him. “You really better be the real deal, Angie. They already like her better than either one of us.”

“That’s not true,” Angie retorts. “Well, it wouldn’t be hard to like anyone better than you these days. You’ve turned into a real jackass, you know that?”

“You live my life and see if you’re all peaches and cream.”

“So you went to war, Frankie,” Angie groans. “It was six months, right at the end. Peggy was in it from day one and she doesn’t feel the need to go around causing trouble in everyone’s love life, does she?”

“Is that really true?” Frankie looks a little impressed at last. “I wondered if you made up some cute story, like-”

“It’s all true,” Angie snaps. “I’m not talking to you again until you accept that and stop treating me like some idiot who happens to have won the raffle. I’m good enough for Peggy, and you bet your butt she’s good enough for me.”

“And yet she’s not here,” Frankie sighs, getting back up off the end of the bed. “See you at dinner, kiddo. That gives you some time to think.”

“You helping that INS lady?” Angie accuses as he makes to leave. “You don’t want to cross me, big brother. You mess this up for me, I won’t forget it.”

“That was almost scary,” Frankie says, trying not to crack up laughing. He leaves, and doesn’t bother closing the door behind him.

***

“That’s all she asked?” Peggy asks for the third time, pacing in the living room of Mr. Jarvis’s suite. He’s the very model of patience, after his initial blustering at the idea of letting a woman into the suite at all. 

“As I said, the more I seemed to confirm your story, the less interested she seemed. Are you sure I can’t offer you a drink, Miss Carter?”

“You should keep in the habit of calling me Peggy. We don’t know that she isn’t surveilling you somehow,” she warns. “I don’t suppose you have any schnapps?”

“I didn’t have you down for a schnapps drinker,” Jarvis says, snooty as ever, but he moves to the little bar in the corner all the same. “Although that’s not your only predilection that came as something of a surprise.”

“You’re not judging, I hope?”

“Is it genuine? Or simply the handiest port in a considerable storm?” Jarvis brings the drink over, and motions for Peggy to sit on the armchair facing his. “Because in this short period of time even I can see that Angie’s affections are not to be trifled with. Not to mention her lovely family.”

“So the ‘Angie’ just trips off the tongue, but I’m stuck with ‘Miss Carter’?” Peggy is deflecting poorly by teasing him, but it’s a limited arsenal she’s working with tonight. She’s tired, honestly. Of HYDRA, of the government, and of being in Italy for any reason beyond sunning herself by some beautiful lake. When did a life like that get so very far out of reach? Peggy frowns even as she thinks it. She’d be out of her mind with boredom by the first afternoon.

“She’s not a colleague,” Jarvis explains. “Although she made a good fist of it today, I thought.”

“She’s actually quite marvelous,” Peggy agrees. “It’s hard to believe she would ever doubt herself. And her aim? Well, that took me years at the shooting range to have an eye like that. I daresay she might be a natural.”

“High praise indeed.”

“I suppose it is.”

“You’re to be married then?” Jarvis sips from his glass, careful not to meet her eye. Peggy is grateful for that, at least.

“Well, you speak highly of the institution,” Peggy counters. “Although I’m yet to hear your wife’s take on it. How is Anna?”

“Thousands of miles away, and not at all pertinent to this conversation,” Jarvis is unfortunately as gifted at avoidance as Peggy herself. She wonders why he would be on a subject he usually shares so freely, all the same. “Does Angie know that in different circumstances, you’d be head over heels at the thought of being engaged to her?”

Peggy chokes on her drink. As she splutters her way back to works, Jarvis continues.

“Only it occurs to me that even you might not know that. I see you may just have realized. How fortuitous.”

“For-fortuitous how?” Peggy blurts. “You can’t be suggesting-”

“Things might go rather more smoothly if you told her there’s genuine feeling involved,” Jarvis told her. “I rather suspect you’d find that feeling reciprocated, if her gazes are anything to go by.”

“I’m sure you’re overstating it,” Peggy scoffs. “She’s simply acting out the part, that’s all. You won’t talk me into making a fool of myself.”

“Well, if you’re sure,” Jarvis doesn’t seem ready to drop the subject, but there’s a knock at the door and a note is passed to him by some hotel worker in uniform.

“Anything we need to worry about?” Peggy asks as he reads the piece of paper.

“New intelligence courtesy of Mr. Stark,” Jarvis announces, crumpling the paper and reaching for the box of matches above the unlit fireplace that dominates the sitting room. Once the paper is burning in the hearth, he turns back to Peggy with a tight smile. “Just as well you have the day free tomorrow. It would seem another outpost has become aware of our smash and grab earlier.”

“Another mission?” Peggy groans.

“Only if you don’t want Europe falling into HYDRA hands,” Jarvis replies. “Of course, if you’d rather be making wedding plans with your unknowingly beloved…”

“I’d forgotten how quickly you get on my nerves, Mr. Jarvis.”

“I do apologize,” he said, without a scrap of sincerity. “Now, we’ll need a map.”


	8. Chapter 8

Angie sees the Underwood woman first, sulking under a parasol outside one of the nicer cafés around the corner from Fancy’s hotel. Judging by the way she’s beating a tattoo with her pen, it seems Peggy hasn’t given her any new material today, or that’s what Angie hopes at least.

She’s asking at the front desk for Fancy’s room when the plants leading to the lobby sway and catch her attention. One of the trimmed shrubs in a pot almost falls over it, but Angie smiles and turns away from the clerk in time to see Peggy’s hand righting it. She’s obviously trying to stay out of sight, and there’s not much secret about why. The hand steadying the plant has bloodied knuckles, and the simple camel-colored dress she’s picked out is torn at the hem and streaked with dirt. Angie completes her increasingly concerned damage assessment as she makes her way to join Peggy, slipping into the service elevator right after her and Fancy.

“Did you ditch the government broad?” Angie asks.

“So you’re talking to me?” Peggy sounds tentative, looking resolutely ahead at the dull metal of the elevator doors, while Fancy stares at his feet. At least he doesn’t look as beat up as Peggy, but Angie is pretty sure she’d feel happier if their current states were reversed.

“I only ask because she’s at a café round the corner,” Angie presses on. 

“We gave her the slip this morning,” Fancy supplies. “And we returned via the side entrance, as you apparently saw.”

“Well I don’t think she’s staying there for the caffè,” Angie tells them. “Chances are she’s checking here every so often to see if you’re back. Where were you anyway?”

“You don’t want to know,” Fancy groans, just as Peggy blurts “Milan”. She won’t meet Angie’s eye, but that show of honesty means something, judging by the way Angie’s heart finally feels a little lighter. Maybe she really is in Peggy’s inner circle now, last night’s temper tantrum be damned. 

“Did they chase you out of town?” Angie asks, and it’s a fair question given the state they’re in. They’re spared having to answer by the elevator doors sliding open, and without being asked Angie follows them to whichever room Fancy’s staying in. She tries to put on a sort of bored expression, as though charming hotels are part of her daily life, not just boarding houses and Automats. 

“I’m a mess,” Peggy groans, catching sight of herself in the mirror by the window. “Gosh, Jarvis, did you really let me walk around like this all day?”

“The worst of it only occurred during that last skirmish,” Fancy defends himself. “And I did offer you some water and a clean handkerchief, if you recall.”

“Well you should get yourself in the tub or something,” Angie decides to advise. “If you’re coming back for family dinner again tonight. I think Ma wants to talk wedding stuff, and I guess that despite everything I mighta sorta said last night, the best plan right now is to carry on.”

“We’ll make a Brit of you yet,” Fancy answers an aching moment later when Peggy fails to respond. “I mean to say, that’s terribly stiff upper lip of you, Miss Martinelli. Miss Carter, isn’t there something you’d like to say?”

Peggy glares at them both and then directs that fury to the carpet at her feet.

“I think I’d prefer a shower,” she mutters, and takes off towards what Angie can only assume is the en suite.

“Sorry,” Fancy offers a minute later.

“She’s not Howard Stark,” Angie snaps, despite her best intentions. “You don’t have to do her dirty work for her. She’ll apologize her own way eventually. You got any kind of schnapps in this dive?”

Fancy gives her a really big smile at that, just long enough that it starts to get a little creepy.

“Of course.” In less time than it takes Angie to get sitting comfortably, he’s back with a good splash of the stuff in a heavy crystal glass that Angie feels destined to shatter. All the more reason to take the drink in one and put the damn thing down carefully.

“You’re welcome for dinner as well.” Angie realizes her manners weren’t exactly in the best shape. “Although trust me, I understand if you want to stay out of the minefield of pretending.”

“I’ve gotten somewhat used to it,” Fancy tells her. “As you rightly mentioned, I’ve done a lot of it for Mr. Stark.”

“You’re really not going to tell me what you were up to in Milan? Do I need to be worried about Peggy?”

“Unfortunately our enemies are rather more embedded in Europe than we had realized. While America has retreated to her shores to take stock and recover, the voids of power here have slowly been filled. It’s going to be a very dangerous spell, I think. We’ll be safer back in New York next week.”

“You’re still not giving me details.” Angie tries to pretend like the vague stuff isn’t terrifying enough.

“Nor are you giving Miss Carter the truth about your feelings.” He looks smug enough that Angie could sock him, and she’s so busy thinking about punching that she forgets to school her features into something way less obvious. She’s blushing up a storm before she can stop herself, and Fancy nods like she just confirmed his stupid hunch. “She doesn’t appear to know you’d be quite happy on her arm even without a visa problem, does she?”

“Crazy lady thinks I’m too good for her,” Angie snorts. “Or that’s the excuse she keeps trotting out. Like she can’t drag the virtuous Angie Martinelli into a life with a few cuts and bruises.”

“She underestimates you.”

“You don’t. You’ve only known me five minutes, but you don’t. Why is that, Mr. Jarvis?” It feels funny to call him by his proper name, all formal like they’re rubbing off on her. 

“I fear it comes from lacking some of her competence, or at least her confidence,” Fancy confides after a moment, taking a mouthful of his own drink and frowning into the glass. He’s standing behind the armchair, barely leaning on the back of it. “You see in times of trouble she simply assumes the person fixing the problem will be her. She doesn’t need to stop and look around for help. Me? I tend to check for assistance first.”

“Sounds sensible to me,” Angie tells him. “You ask me, that one in there is a little pig-headed.”

Just then the phone rings, the tones shrill in the echoing space of the suite. Fancy makes to answer it like they were never in a conversation, and within a couple of seconds his voice is all clipped and angry.

“It seems we have company,” he sighs, hanging up the receiver. “Your theory about Miss Underwood has proven correct and she’s on her way up now. The hotel staff were unable to hold her.”

“Jesus Christ,” Angie groans, mostly because there’s no one to tell her off for it. “Will this pen pusher give us a break already?”

“If you wanted to hide in the other room, I’ll tell her you both left for dinner already,” Fancy offers. “Let me take this,” he swipes Angie’s glass and spirits it away in the little bar in the corner. “Come along, Miss Martinelli.”

“I thought we’d graduated to Angie,” she teases. 

“Habit. Stress,” he explains with a wry smile. “You’ll be just fine in there. Warn our favorite mermaid, if you can.”

“Aye, aye cap’n,” Angie jokes. They’ll get rid of this administrator and go off to dinner, and maybe, just maybe she’ll think a little bit more about what Fancy just said to her about feelings.

***

The water pressure here is more than Peggy dared dream of. Admittedly it’s just a touch below agony when the rasp of warm water hits broken skin, but it’s almost pleasant to have drumming pressure on everything that will surely come up in bruises at once. She lingers for more than the gentle pummelling, if she’s completely honest. Sneaking back into the hotel she didn’t expect to be accosted by Angie, and whether it’s a good sign for their little falling out to be resolved so quickly is more than Peggy can fathom. 

Not that she should be fussing over Angie’s intentions, romantic or otherwise, when she barely escaped her latest HYDRA interaction with her life. Something about her is sluggish this week, distracted when she least intends to be. It seems when assessing situations she’s worrying not just about surviving them, but about getting out in a condition that won’t embarrass or worry Angie. Or her lovely family, as kind as they are welcoming. Frankie being the notable exception, but something in his cynicism is calling out to Peggy. She wonders if they oughtn’t to have a conversation soon, providing this whole charade continues. There might be a way of getting through to him that the others won’t see.

She hears doors open and close over the water, her hearing still as sharp as ever. When no one makes to disturb her, she reaches for the soap at last and lathers up as delicately as she knows how. She’ll apologize to Angie when she gets out. They’ll have delicious food, and Peggy will get back into her latest legend wholeheartedly, providing a fake wedding that Hollywood could only dream of. She’ll make sure Angie is still her friend when the sham has to end, and if she can deal with HYDRA at the same time, well. So much the better. 

Peggy’s in really quite an improved mood when she steps out of the shower onto the plush mat, dripping all over it. It’s then that she realizes her barracks mentality of get in, get out has failed her, because while her torn dress and smalls are on the floor in a heap that appears to have caught some overflow from the shower, she didn’t think to actually bring a towel, in her haste to escape Angie’s loaded comments.

Of course Jarvis has them filed away anywhere but the actual bathroom. There’s a flannel that might cover one breast, hanging by the sink. Peggy’s initial sweep of the suite’s bedroom comes back to her, and she recalls the stack of fluffy white towels in a neat pile on some shelf or other. Bloody typical. Still, with Angie keeping Jarvis busy in the sitting room, there’s no reason Peggy can’t make a dash for it. The sooner she’s dry, the sooner she can get back to her things at Nonna’s house.

 _Angie’s_ Nonna’s house. It’s not like they’re really family.

***

Angie’s so intent on getting out of the firing line that she doesn’t really look around the bedroom as she scurries in to hide. Okay, maybe she registers just a glimpse of movement out of the edge of one eye, but she’s just making a beeline for the side of the bed, in case this ends with her needing to hide under it. 

She hasn’t been tackled since she was about ten years old, not in the full body, hit you like a train way that got Frankie and his idiot friends yelled at for an hour straight while Papa cleaned up her scrapes at the kitchen sink. She’d just wanted to play, as always, and Frankie had said only if she played the real rules.

Angie had never, ever backed down from one of his stupid challenges. She’d been bruised for days, trying to walk it off and act like it had been no big deal that a big lunk of a 13-year-old had taken her down like a sack of flour.

Peggy Carter hits much, much harder than that.

***

Why in the name of all that is holy is there a person right where Peggy is trying to-

Oh.

 _Oh_.

“Uh, Peg, you’re kind of lying on my-”

“Miss Carter!”

Well, that chirpy troublemaking voice Peggy would have recognized even if her head hadn’t snapped to the right. Angie must have too, since they’re now cheek to cheek. Peggy is also very aware of her other cheeks, still damp from the shower and feeling a breeze blow across them from the open door.

“I had no idea,” Jarvis steps in to save the day. “I thought you girls left hours ago.”

“Can’t a gal get some privacy?” Angie groans, and though her cheek is flaming hot against Peggy’s cooler one, her voice doesn’t tremble for a second. Peggy is going to find the fly-by-night acting coach who spent more time trying to prepare Angie for the casting couch than the stage and let him know he got one thing right. Before punching his lights out.

“This is, well, I mean...” Underwood is almost choking, and Peggy loathes that she’s enjoying the sight. She makes a great production of pulling at the bedspread, dragging it over her skin and reluctantly prying her body away from Angie’s. 

“Dear brother, you never did learn not to come barging into my room,” Peggy lets how peeved she truly is seep into her voice, coloring every syllable. “I can’t imagine what your excuse is, Miss Underwood, but I’ll thank you to return to public quarters and allow me to finish dressing. With my fiancée’s assistance, of course. She has quite the eye for fashion.”

“I do,” Angie agrees, still prone on the bed. She almost manages to make it sound like a fact instead of a question. “Scram, you two. We’re almost married, so don’t go disapproving right out loud. Not like anybody’s gonna end up fiddling with the dates on a birth certificate now, is it?”

Jarvis finally steers the gaping Underwood woman back into the sitting room, and Peggy collapses face down on the bed again, this time at Angie’s side. 

“I am so, so very sorry,” she grumbles into the duvet, before twisting to face the woman beside her. “Angie, did I hurt you?”

“It’ll take more than a flying tackle,” Angie assures her, propping herself up on her elbows. “Although jeez, English. Didn’t have you down for a rugby player.”

“I never did make the matchday fifteen, no. I’ll dress,” Peggy promises, still very aware of her nakedness beneath the slippery material. 

“Or I could strip down along with you, really sell it,” Angie teases. “Although I’ll be honest, I’m not sure you’ve earned those privileges yet.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” Peggy agrees. “And I know better than to push my luck. Have I told you lately how truly grateful I am for all this?”

“I figured that’s why you were throwing your naked body at me,” Angie sasses. “Though a bunch of flowers would have done the trick. You think I can go back out there? Only it kinda sounded like I need to stay and supervise your wardrobe decisions, right?”

“Sorry for roping you in.”

“Hey, no skin off my nose,” Angie assures her, sitting on the bed now, looking for all the world like she might pat the covers and issue a silent but coy invitation after all. Peggy finds herself forgetting to exhale at the thought, shaking her head to reactivate her stalled progress. “Though I figure you’ve only got whatever you threw in a bag last night.”

“We’ll come up with something,” Peggy sighs. “I don’t imagine Jarvis has many dresses in here, though.”

“We’ll make do with his shirts and ties if it comes to it,” Angie is tracking Peggy’s movements, years of being watched create the prickle at the back of her neck without having to look over and confirm it. “Gimme a sewing machine and these curtains might be worth something.”

“You really are very resourceful.” Peggy offers the compliment with quite genuine affection. She’s growing more impressed with Angie by the day, something she’ll tell her quietly when they’re both in a state of full dress, perhaps.

***

Angie’s glad that Ma has rattled on about wedding arrangements all of last night and today, because it makes answering the quickfire questions from Miss Underwood a damn sight easier, especially since Peggy’s contribution is a tight smile and nods so sharp they seem to want to connect with Underwood’s face, headbutt-style.

“In fact, we’re finalizing the arrangements this evening,” Angie finishes up as sweetly as she started, despite her patience for this bureaucracy wearing thin. Sticking to the rules is one thing, but Angie can smell a bully from ten blocks away, and this whole deal feels personal. What Peggy the spy can have done to irritate Immigration is beyond Angie, but if Peggy knows already she isn’t sharing.

“On which note,” Fancy interrupts at last. “I really must be driving the girls up to the house. I gave Nonna a promise I’d keep them on time over these busy days.”

“Of course,” Underwood is all smiles, not one of them reaching her cold, pale eyes. “I’ll contact you tomorrow if I need to speak with anyone else.”

“Any idea when this investigation might be done?” Peggy is pointed in her question. “Only it seems you’re searching for untruths in the midst of a very real wedding that’s actually going ahead, supported by our families. I do wonder what it is you’re hoping to find, Dottie.”

Oh, it’s not like Peggy to drop the formalities. She must be angry. 

“I’ll know it when I see it,” Underwood answers after a moment. “Please, don’t let me keep you from your family dinner.” She stands to leave, taking her sweet time about repacking her notepad and pen in her purse. Only when the door swings closed behind her, the click of the lock as loud as a church bell in the strained silence, does anyone allow themselves to relax. 

***

Dinner is an informal affair, the meat laid out on platters with bowls of potatoes and vegetables covering the center section of the large table. Peggy helps herself, filling a plate for Angie automatically as though they’re back at the Griffith, knowing she’s stopped to chat with Nonna first. Peggy steps nimbly out of the way when Frankie approaches, passing Angie’s plate off to her before taking what has become ‘her’ seat as the days have progressed. She has a mouthful of delicious food when Francesca gets hold of her.

“Peggy, dear,” she squeezes her shoulder and sits in Angie’s seat. “I’m so glad you’re here this evening. We have something very important to talk about.”

“We do?” Peggy blurts after swallowing hastily and narrowly avoiding choking.

“Yes, and I think you know what.”

Peggy offers her best quizzical glance.

“Your bachelorette party, of course. You didn’t think only Angie would get one, did you?”

There’s a merciful eruption of laughter near them at that point, just enough to cover Peggy’s low groan of despair.  
ß


	9. Chapter 9

“Peg, you gotta calm down!” Angie hisses from where she’s propped against the pillows, applying night cream in vigorous circles over her cheeks. “You’ll wake half the house, pacing like that!”

Peggy kicks off her shoes, barely breaking stride, but it reduces the noise of the brisk steps to a dull thud. It’s another flash of her legs in the process, forcing Angie out of her studied ignorance she’s been shooting for every since a naked Peggy got her horizontal earlier that afternoon. There ought to be acting awards for being able to hold conversation over dinner like she didn’t know for sure exactly what curves her friend had been concealing under beautiful tailoring all this time. A Tony for not choking at the knowledge of what it felt like to be _under_ Peggy Carter. An Oscar for not standing on the dinner table and announcing that nothing they were talking about could possibly force its way into Angie’s head, not while the cinematic replays of their moment in flagrante consumed her every brain cell. 

“I’ve gone along with everything, _everything_ , Angie. No one can say I haven’t been a good sport, but really a party like this is beyond the pale. You have to do something. Surely, there’s some way out of this?”

Angie shrugs.

“It’s what we signed up for, dontcha think? I don’t mind lying to my family for you, but I don’t like being rude when they offer something out of the goodness of their hearts.” Angie put the cream down on the nightstand and patted the covers to echo that afternoon. “You want to think about coming to bed maybe? Tomorrow will be a long enough day without being exhausted on top of it.”

“Right,” Peggy snaps, turning mid-pace and stalking off into their little bathroom. Angie counts down the routine - the cold cream, the soap and water, the pinning of curls and tying of the scarf. Another pause to allow for some moisturizer, and finally taking off the necklace and earrings, stashing them in whichever hidden pocket Peggy uses for that kind of thing. Angie’s never seen anything left by the bed or hanging from a hook in the bathroom. Almost exactly in time with Angie’s mental routine, Peggy emerges in her nightdress, only the engagement ring from Nonna still to be taken off for the night.

“Hit the lamp, English.” Angie finds it easier to command and wriggle down into the bed than to watch Peggy stalk across the room to her. The ring rattles gently on the nightstand a minute later, and Angie holds her breath as the mattress sinks just a little, Peggy bringing a little cool night air with her into the warmth of the sheets. As commanded, Peggy plunges them into semi-darkness, the curtains not quite pulled enough for a blackout. Angie closes them tight every evening, but she’s noticed Peggy opens them at least a crack at some point before they turn in. Sure enough, she does just that on her way to bed.

“Goodnight,” Peggy says, pulling back the sheets on her side and reaching towards the lamp. 

“Wait,” Angie asks, leaning across the pillows. “You don’t want the curtains shut properly?”

“It annoys you?”

“No, it’s just it feels a little pointed, that you always go and undo it after I do it.”

“We’re not married yet,” Peggy teases, a smile finally back on her face. “But bickering over curtains certainly makes it seem that way.”

“You don’t like the dark, do you?” Angie won’t be deterred.

“Not complete darkness, no. Out here, it’s not like New York. Or London, for that matter. I haven’t slept with the room entirely dark since… well, for quite some time.”

“Since the Blitz?” Angie pieces it together. “You said once, talking to Dottie over dinner, that you couldn’t let a single bit of light show, not doors or windows, right?”

“Right,” Peggy folds herself into the bed, closer than usual to Angie. She can still reach to click the lamp off though, plunging the room into not-quite-darkness. “They’d turn the streetlamps off, too. No lights from buses, from cars. It was like a giant came of murder-in-the dark, really. I can’t say I miss it.”

“Well, for as long as we’re married,” Angie says, fighting a sudden thick feeling in her throat. “I promise I won’t pull the curtains tight closed like that anymore. Okay?”

“It doesn’t traumatize me, darling. I simply prefer it like this. If you can’t sleep because of it…”

“I sleep better with you in the bed,” Angie confesses, after swearing she’d never say anything of the kind, over and over. “Maybe it’s comforting to know you can kick the butt of anyone who happens to break in.”

“That and the revolver under the pillow?”

“English, you do not!” Angie gasps.

“Look and see,” Peggy invites, sitting further forward to allow it. Angie swallows hard, and edges her fingers under the plump pillow, waiting for her fingers to touch metal.

***

“Oh my god!” Angie yelps as Peggy drops back towards the pillow like a stone. It’s a move she hasn’t tried since boarding school, convincing Gwendoline that a frog was trapped beneath the cotton and feathers. 

“Of course I don’t put a dangerous weapon near you without your knowledge,” Peggy admonishes, lying in repose like Cleopatra, wiggling her eyebrows a little. “Give me a little credit, Angie.”

“Spies have guns!” Angie points out, managing to keep her voice down. “And for that mean little trick, nearly breaking my wrist with your fat head for the record, you deserve all the bachelorette-ing you get!”

“Did I hurt you?” Peggy sits up quicksmart, eyes well-adjusted to the gloom now and reaching instinctively for Angie’s retracted arm. “Oh don’t tell me I did, I just wanted to play a little trick when the chance presented itself.”

“Nothing that can’t be kissed better,” Angie mutters, and for all their bravado these past few days, it doesn’t sound remotely like she’s joking. Peggy takes a steadying breath, and considers. Read this wrong and a difficult holiday could become a painfully awkward one. It’s just that something in the easy camaraderie of tonight, even despite her own bellyaching, seems to indicate a chance not otherwise taken. Peggy Carter might be a great many unflattering things, but she doesn’t ever want to consider herself a coward.

That’s why, she tells herself, it makes perfect sense to carefully elevate Angie’s wrist. It’s logic defined to press trembling lips to that allegedly injured joint and make a concerted effort to, yes, kiss it better. “I’m sorry,” is mumbled against skin, barely words at all, but a feeling Peggy can only hope will be felt from the sheer force of it alone. 

“Oh,” Angie sighs the word, and it takes forever to fall from her lips. By the time it does, when Peggy lifts her eyes to look at those lips, Angie’s palm is pressed against Peggy’s cheek. And suddenly those lips are ever so much closer than they were just a moment ago. Since she apparently kisses things now, and hell, they’ve already done this particular act for an audience, Peggy leans in and lets it happen. She’s never been great at just letting things happen, but this is a remarkable exception to make.

***

Angie kisses back like her life depends on it. The skin on her wrist is still tingling from the touch of Peggy’s mouth, but now their lips are meeting in a far less gentle kiss. Angie has no intention of letting it end anytime soon. She’s cradling Peggy’s face as they kiss, willing her not to pull back or edge away from this overdue moment between them. Days of pretending, of arguments, of a dozen people pressed around them seemingly all the time, it seems to all have been leading to this.

Was it really only a matter of hours ago Angie found herself beneath a naked Peggy? Because it would seem, from the way Peggy is grabbing fistfuls of Angie’s cotton nightdress that she wants a little reciprocity on that front. Angie lets her own hands drop from Peggy’s beautiful face to bunch fabric in a similar fashion, sure as hell not about to be outmatched in a moment like this. If it all blows up in a minute, Angie won’t have it be because she hid her very genuine interest in something real happening between them at last. 

“Wait,” Peggy pants when their kisses taper off for a moment, though they’re not able to stop altogether, still stealing darted tastes of one another, even as Peggy struggles to form words. “Doesn’t this mean I’m taking advantage?”

“Seems to me if we’re going through all this, we should-”

They’re interrupted by a crash of the bedroom door swinging inwards. Panicked, they spring apart, only to find Frankie looming at the foot of the bed.

“Get out of here, you goddamned ape!” Angie launches herself down over the comforter towards him. “Frankie, if you’ve been drinking, I swear to God, I’ll-”

“What’s all this noise?” Papa comes in, still half-asleep but ready to fight. “I heard a commotion and oh! Oh ladies, I apologize. I uh… Frankie! What the hell are you doing, barging in on the girls like this?”

“I came to… to prove!” Frankie is definitely drunk, swaying on his feet. “This is a scam, Pa, and that girl is no good for Angie. I can’t stand by for all these parties, for a goddamned wedding, and keep my trap shut!”

“Oh you’ll shut it,” Angie leverages herself straight from the mattress into a flying punch at her brother’s jaw. She socks him but good, and the moron is on the floor quick enough to break Angie’s landing, which is a win in anybody’s book. Unfortunately, it’s just when Ma decides to make her appearance, hair in a scarf and goop all over her face. 

“Angela Martinelli, what are you doing to your brother?”

“I believe she’s defending my honor,” Peggy says, and it’s not breathless at all. She’s the picture of poise when Angie turns around, sheets all pulled up over her, Miss Modesty. “Though we were just having a private chat about our future together, so I think Angie felt a little threatened by the interruption. You can let him up now, darling.”

Angie scrambles to attention, practically, like Peggy is her drill-sergeant or something. The way Ma narrows her eyes suggests she notices that Angie did as she was told for once, instead of mouthing off or getting another punch in. Well, just for that Angie aims a swift kick at Frankie’s leg. It hurts her nearly as much as him with no shoe on, but the bum deserves everything he gets. 

“Francesco, what is going on with you this week?” Ma asks, and Angie doesn’t care to hear the answer. She was this close, so freaking close, to getting a real interlude with Peggy, and now this family circus. A shot of schnapps seems pretty damn appealing right now. 

“Whatever is up with this big oaf, can you shout it out amongst yourselves?” Angie demands. “Or at least in one of your rooms? Jesus.”

“Angela!” Both parents scold. “Bad mood or not, there’s no need for casual blasphemy.

“Trust me, it wasn’t casual,” Angie smarts right back at them. “If our Lord had been here, he’d have socked Frankie, too.”

“We’ll deal with this,” Papa promises, extending a hand to help his son from the floor. “Frannie, come on, let’s get this drunkard in the right bed and let the girls rest. Or uh, talk about their future.”

He winks at Angie, trying a little too hard to be the hip and happening dad, and that’s a mental cold shower she really didn’t need. She can only hope Peggy didn’t catch it. 

Once they’re out the door, Angie stomps across the floor and wedges the room’s only chair under the handle. She’s practically fizzing with rage by the time she gets back to the bed, and that’s only compounded by the cool look that’s slipped over Peggy’s features.

***

Saved by the bell, Peggy thinks to herself, like a grateful boxer who’s taken on more than she ought to. How foolish she’d been to give into these feelings for Angie, that irresponsible urge that could ruin their friendship. Or worse, lead to putting Angie in the kind of danger that had befallen Colleen. Which means, Peggy realizes, that she’ll have to think about protection and shielding of Angie when they’re back and perpetuating this sham in New York. HYDRA agents will take a wife whether she’s for a green card or not, and that doesn’t bear thinking about. 

Angie can tell already, thankfully, and perhaps she’s relieved not to have to follow through on that ridiculous idea. Peggy has told her already that it’s bad enough she’ll have to pretend to be a wife, but she won’t force Angie to feel more for her than friendship. That’s more than Peggy dared to ask for in the first place. 

That kiss, though. 

No. Peggy must be resolute. Giving into easy temptation, pushing things farther than they should be, that’s simply asking for trouble. A crazy moment can happen between any two people, and the only person she’s cared for this much before is… well. He’s lost to her somewhere in the Arctic, and although Steve deserved a far better fate, at least Peggy can make sure Angie does get the life and happiness she deserves instead. Peggy simply can’t fail anyone else so important, it simply won’t do at all.

Even though that really was one hell of a kiss. Better, even, than their public display at dinner the other night. Better than almost any that Peggy has ever been party to, and definitely comparable with the very best.

She isn’t talking, she realizes, simply rationalizing all this in her head. More troubling, Angie isn’t talking either, but rather pummelling her pillow back into shape and settling down for the night, back turned to Peggy when there’s a clear lack of invitation to pick up where they left off.

It would be so easy to fix this, Peggy knows. She could simply touch Angie’s shoulder and the dear girl would spring up in a second, babbling about kisses and engagements and getting caught up in the inherent drama of the situation all over again. Peggy keeps her hands resolutely by her sides. She has to do this for both of them, if they’re ever to survive this whole charade. Kissing now will be kept only for public, with reasonable restraints on them, and clear reasons to do so. Such as finalizing their wedding vows.

On that note Peggy feels a little queasy. She settles back against her own pillow, staring blankly at the ceiling and willing the shadows to move. She listens as breath catches in Angie’s throat, and for a split-second it seems that she’ll break the silence after all. Instead, Angie clears her throat quietly, and a few minutes later she seems to drift into sleep.

For Peggy, that’s at least an hour or more away. She isn’t looking forward to spending that time with more of her own thoughts.

***

Angie scrambles out of bed first, even though she’s still tired. She grabs clean clothes and makes haste to Nonna’s room, washing and dressing there because she knows the older woman will be up and supervising the household already. It means a chance that Peggy will sleep in, and Angie can get a grip on herself before the mortification sets in all over again. Peggy shouldn’t go starting things out of pity, or because she thinks she has to throw Angie a bone every now and then to keep her sweet on their deal. She’ll tell her just as much, maybe, if they get a minute’s privacy today.

Fat chance.

She heads into breakfast and there are somehow more aunts and cousins than the other night, chattering as they slice and fill and pack food into baskets that definitely say a trip is in the offing. 

“Angela!” Ma is in fine form, happy amongst her in-laws. “The registrar confirmed, your wedding will go ahead tomorrow. He said five would be the nicest time, get a few photos with the sun just right?”

“If you say so,” Angie sits down and helps herself to some bread and what might be grape jelly, but it tastes more like plum on a second bite. “Whatever you think, Ma.”

“Don’t you want to go fetch Peggy and tell her? Honestly, I thought you’d be more excited.”

“There’s no need to fetch me,” Peggy says from the door. “And Angie’s still a little sore with her big brother, I’m sure that’s all that’s dampening her mood.”

“We were counting on you to cheer her up, Peggy Carter,” Ma teases, drawing Peggy into a hug like it’s the easiest thing in the world, like it’s some inalienable right along with life, liberty and the goddamned pursuit of happiness. Angie frowns as Peggy tenses in the brief embrace, like maybe it’s not just one Martinelli that she doesn’t want pawing at her. That’s just fine. 

“I’m cheery enough. Just like Peggy here, who can’t wait for her bachelorette party. Did we invite the army? Judging by all these plates, I mean.” Angie doesn’t much care if she sounds petulant. Ma’s more than used to that after all these years.

“Well,” Ma says. “I’ve been chatting with your aunts about how they do things here. But what we all thought would be nice would be if we divided this big group of us in two, and made sure most of the English speakers go with Peggy, and we have a grand day out where both of you get all the advice we can think of about married life. With all the wine we could pull out of the cellar, of course.”

“That sounds…” Peggy looks at Angie with pleading eyes, free of Ma’s hugs for now. When Angie does nothing more than raise an eyebrow, Peggy finishes with some very fake enthusiasm. “Wonderful.”

“We don’t want to just stay here in the village though, so I’ve put Andrea in charge of your party, Peggy. Don’t you worry, he might be a man, but he knows how to entertain a crowd.”

“Oh, I wasn’t worried,” Peggy replies, and Angie almost can’t hear the gritted teeth in it. “Do I need to bring anything in particular?”

“No, what you’re wearing is just fine,” Ma tells her, smiling in approval at the fancy lines of Peggy’s dress. It sits perfectly, a beautiful dark blue, even though Angie knows for a fact she hasn’t had to press it since it was unearthed from her case a few days ago. “But speaking of clothes, come with me. Angie, your Nonna is taking care of your dress, but I figured someone had to stand up for Peggy here.”

“Dress?” Peggy repeats, genuinely confused. “I thought we’d just marry in something smart we brought with us.”

“Not in this family, hon,” Ma corrects her. “Now come, come. Just a minute upstairs to make sure everything’s what I guessed.”

“Ma can tell a bra size at fifty paces,” Angie points out. “You know it’ll fit just fine.”

“No harm in a bit of last-minute pinning. You help your aunts, Angela. Or go see Nonna about your dress, whatever you like. There’ll be time tonight, and tomorrow come to that.”

“Fine,” Angie snorts, helping herself to some coffee instead. She doesn’t look around as Ma steers Peggy out of the room.

***


	10. Chapter 10

“This is really too kind,” Peggy blusters as they stride into Andrea and Francesca’s room. There’s not so much as an errant sock in evidence, the bed neatly made and only an opened book on the nightstand to show the room is occupied. Well, that and the tailor’s dummy by the window, draped in an ivory silk that makes Peggy’s breath catch in her throat. She’s not a professional clotheshorse, not really, but she’s always had an eye for something special. It’s one of the few recompenses of the espionage life, the opportunities for dress-up.

“Now I sneaked a look at a couple of your dresses the other day, and I’ve done my best guess here. You have a lovely figure, so I bet that buys us a lot of leeway. I could make curtains look good on your with a few pins and some tape.”

Peggy smiles, tracing the simple band that cinches the waist with one tentative fingertip. The cap sleeves are a lace more delicate than should be possible for something thrown together in a couple of days, and Francesca hears the unspoken question.

“I spent a long time hoping Angie would meet someone she loved. I sew to keep me sane, or something like it, so there’s a few prototypes in my closet. When she told us the night before we left what was happening, I threw two of my best ones in the trunk just in case.”

“Will Angie have the other?” Peggy asks, unable to tear her eyes from the detail of the dress. She’s almost itching in her desire to try it on, though she should be horrified.

“Only if Nonna’s doesn’t fit. It’s all lace, if I remember right from the photo. Nonna won’t let me at it until Angie tries it as is, though. I have some pearls, not real of course but they’re pretty. I’m going to add just at the top of the bodice there, does that work?” Francesca is attuned to everything Peggy thinks about the dress, and yes, pearls will be the perfect finishing touch.”

“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble, for me. I want Angie to have the very best of things, of course, but I really would have just picked out a suitable dress from somewhere.” Peggy insists.

“It’s what a mother does,” Francesca says, and it’s unbearably kind. “I don’t mean to push, Peggy, but with you being an orphan I wanted you to have some kind of mother’s influence in all this. You tell me if it’s too far, but you must miss her so much at times like these. My own mother didn’t make our wedding, and I don’t know… It was a happy day all the same, but it could have been so much happier.”

“I don’t know that she would have ever been this kind of mother,” Peggy admits, and it’s shocking how quickly Francesca has turned this room into a confessional. “She loved me dearly, of course I know that. And I loved her, too. She was just never one for any kind of fuss. She and my father married in four minutes flat. I remember her telling me that. They went home to dinner in their own house that night, and their witnesses were strangers.”

“They do things differently there?”

“I think the difference lay more with the Carters, not the country,” Peggy says, feeling tears starting to well unexpectedly. She hasn’t talked about any of this - the truth and not some purloined details for a convincing cover story - in years. “I always admired that about them. Marching to the beat of their own drummer, I suppose.”

“I see that in you,” Francesca tells her. “In a very good way. I don’t think life will be boring for my Angela as long as she’s with you, will it?”

“I hope not.”

“It had better be safe though, I tell you that.” Francesca moves closer, unbuttoning the dress and slipping it from the mannequin. “No time for prudishness, hon, get that dress dropped and let’s see if I guessed right.” Peggy does as she’s told. If nothing else, she’s always been a good soldier. 

“Well, New York isn’t as dangerous as everyone says,” Peggy tries to gloss over that veiled warning, hoping they’ll stick a few pins and she can flee the scene. She should have known she’d have no such luck.

“I don’t ask too many questions, never have,” Francesca responds after the silence is stretched to breaking point. “I know something ain’t quite right though, but so long as you do right by Angela and that great big heart of hers, I’m happy not knowing… whatever it is.”

Peggy’s heart sinks. This is the problem with having people around so much, letting them pry into private matters. No doubt Angie’s Ma has pried at more than Peggy’s dress size, and that could be a real hiccup in the current climate. Peggy’s already losing her citizenship, she doesn’t need her job to go right after she finds a way to stay in the country.

“I don’t know quite what you’re talking about,” she lies, instead. “But a mother has a right to worry. It’s my job to assure you no harm will come to Angie as long as I have breath in my body, Mrs. Martinelli. Does that sound fair?”

“Sounds about right. Turn.”

Peggy turns, holding her hands up when her elbow is gently tapped. A moment later and she’s being steered towards a mirror in the corner. She hardly dares look, but a deep, steadying breath and she raises her eyes to really look at herself for the first time in what might be years.

“Oh,” is all she can conjure up. Because honestly, in this simple and stylish dress, she truly understands what it means to feel beautiful.

***

Nonna is chattering so fast that even Angie can’t keep up. She pulls out the relevant _vestito da sposa_ at one point and understands why she’s being dragged back to Nonna’s room, the grand room that was the whole house when she and Nonno first bought it. That they’ve expanded so much, to fit such a big family and so many friends, makes Angie feel really kinda proud to be part of it all. She has connection, she has love, she has shared characteristics that she can see in some of the faces and hear in some of the voices. It’s a beautiful thing, and she feels a pang that Peggy doesn’t have the same thing; maybe she never has. 

No, Angie tells herself. Feeling sorry for Peggy when the dame is just fine by herself is what causes all these messes. Angie will do enough to make Nonna happy and then she’s going to keep things real distant and civil until the day Peggy says they can divorce. People have survived a lot worse. Plus, it’ll be great acting experience. A wedding, being served divorce papers, convincing her whole family and the federal government. Barbara Stanwyck would do the same with this material, Angie’s sure of it.

Then Nonna is pulling a dress from the very back of her simple wardrobe and Angie is dumbstruck. All her resolve weakens because the beautiful ivory lace in front of her is exactly how she pictured her wedding dress, the few silly times she’s ever let herself truly dream about it. 

“You like.” It’s a statement from Nonna, not a question. Angie nods, reaching out with tentative fingers, overwhelmed when Nonna hands it gratefully to her. It feels almost too delicate to be touched, but Angie lets the sun from the window fall on it and hugs it close to her chest. 

“Can I…?”

“Si, si,” Nonna insists. Like Angie was ever getting out of this room without trying it on. For the second time in half an hour she’s changing in this room, shrugging off the red dress she picked out for the day and picking it off the floor when Nonna clears her throat. Ma comes barrelling through the door just as Angie gets the zipper fastened, and she actually cries out at the sight of Angie all dressed up.

“C’mon, Ma,” Angie tries to break the moment a little. “So Nonna can pick a dress. No big deal, right?”

“No big deal,” Ma scoffs, gathering Angie up in a bone-crushing hug. “I thought I was happy seeing how good Peggy looks in my own little creation, but Angela you’re a vision. This is everything I ever wanted, since they put you in my arms that first time.”

What Angie tries to say in return is smothered by her mother’s ongoing hug. She relents, giving into it for a nice minute or so. This might be the time to tell a little of the truth, get the sympathy and comfort she’s been craving for days. Angie actually starts to form the words, she can feel then like tiny weights on her tongue, but when she wriggles free both Nonna and Ma are crying such happy tears that she doesn’t want to take it from them.

“Well if you’re getting me in the dress, Ma, you think you could start wishing for me to win a Tony?”

“I’ll think about it. Now take that off before you find something to spill on it,” Ma warns. She starts chattering to Nonna, and Angie just lets it wash over her. At least if she never finds love for real, she’ll have given them all this excitement. That she wants to cry is a small price to pay for giving her family something to be proud of at last.

***

“Heading out?” Frankie hovers in the doorway as Peggy puts her things neatly back in her bag. “I noticed you escaped the rabble in the kitchen.”

“So you came to apologize?” Peggy knows it sounds prim, but she can’t entirely forgive the interruption at such a crucial moment, nor the resulting mess she has no idea how to fix. “You can keep it brief.”

“Don’t talk to me that way,” he warns. “Don’t talk like you think you’re better than all this. That Underwood dame says you’re doing this for a visa, and I think I believe her. Like hell will I stand by and watch Angie get her heart broken. You gotta see how sweet that kid is.”

“Hardly a kid,” Peggy closes her case and turns to face him. “Even if I were doing it for some bureaucratic reason, don’t you think I would do right by her? You don’t know the first thing about me. Why would you assume I only want to hurt her? We’ve been friends for two years before any of this developed. And I’m not in the business of hurting my friends.” 

Peggy ignores the pang in her chest at that. She can’t think about Colleen, or about Steve. It will show on her face, and Frankie will never let it go if he senses blood.

“You’re all the same, doll. Don’t think because you say it all pretty that it makes you any more believable. You come in here, taking advantage of my parents, my Nonna is 90, for chrissakes. You didn’t have a second thought when you actually met these people? Nah, you just want your piece of paper and screw anyone left waiting around for you, huh?”

“Frankie?” Peggy sees for the first time that this isn’t anger. Well, there’s some, but it’s clearly misdirected. He looks close to tears instead, an incongruous sight on such a strapping man. For all that Angie is slender and delicate, Frankie is tall and broad. His hair is jet black, his eyes as light as his sister’s. He can’t look at Peggy now, but she approaches him like a lion tamer without a chair. She lays a hand on his forearm before speaking again, ready to block should he lash out. “What happened?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I think perhaps it’s time you finally tell someone. And if I’m the charlatan you think, I won’t be around long enough to tell anyone else, will I?”

“Well, if you admit you’re scamming my sister-”

“I’m not. It’s up to you whether you believe me or not.”

“Fine,” Frankie sighs, slumping into the room’s solitary chair. Peggy retracts her hand but stays up in his space as far as is proper. “Let’s just say you’re not the first opportunistic bride I’ve come across, okay?”

“You were married?”

“I thought I was.” Peggy sits on the end of the bed, staring him down until he continues. “Apparently you’re familiar what it was like, by the end? I was in France.”

“I spent most of the last year in the States, but yes. I toured France and Belgium after peace was declared. Berlin, too. There are sights I don’t think I could ever forget.”

“I met this girl. French, or maybe she was Belgian. Met her in occupied Paris. It was all very ‘we could die any minute’. I lost my head, she lost her… well y’know. Or so she said. Figures she was probably lying about all of that, too. We married when I got my orders to come home, it was one big victory party that whole week. I came to wave her off at the docks, my transport was the next morning. She never showed, but the ticket office said her ticket was collected.”

“Did you look for her?”

“I had to come home. I wrote her, at everywhere she’d ever told me she had connections. I tried the embassies, too. Not a word. I’m sure she took the marriage certificate and ticket, called herself a war widow, and she’s probably living quite a life on some other schmuck’s dime. Figures she’ll avoid New York though, so maybe it’s Chicago or Los Angeles.”

“And that’s what you think of me?”

“Seems there’s quite a trade in it. Add in that we never heard of you as anything but some crush Angie was trying to play it cool about-”

“Excuse me?”

“Oh yeah, you’re the best of pals. But you know what she’s like. Mentioning your name too much, then trying to stop herself. Then she’d mention you even more. I don’t know if anyone paid too much mind, since we all assumed you weren’t that way. Angie’s got a bad track record on picking the ones that can’t love her back. Just like Chiara.”

“I don’t think there’s much doubt Chiara cared for her,” Peggy corrects. “She didn’t have the luxury of choosing Angie. That’s something quite different.”

“But you reckon you choose her?”

“I’m trying to. You’re not making that very easy, especially for Angie. I always had the impression you two were close.”

“We were. We are… I guess since everything happened with Genevieve, I haven’t really talked as much. I couldn’t bear to tell them I had this big happy homecoming planned, and it was all for nothing. They knew I had a girl over there. I just lied and said it didn’t stick.”

“That’s a long time to be holding onto heartbreak,” Peggy tells him. “It takes a long time anyway, trust me. It’s just so much worse when you do it all alone.”

“Thanks for the prescription, doc,” Frankie says, his sneer returning. “Maybe you’re not all bad, Carter. But you won’t shake that Underwood dame with listening and a bit of advice, I’ll tell you that.”

“Oh, I can deal with her sort,” Peggy assures him. “If you’ve decided to stop causing trouble between us, do you think you could say sorry to your sister? I won’t tell her anything we’ve discussed, so you don’t have to. But I’d like to see her good mood back in time for the wedding.”

“I suppose I could get to that, yeah,” Frankie answers, lingering in the doorway. “I’ll still kick your ass if you hurt her. Talk or no talk.”

“I have every faith,” Peggy assures him. 

***

“English,” Angie pulls her aside as they’re milling around in the courtyard with the family. “Did you put the frighteners on Frankie?”

“Whatever makes you think I would do that? Or that I even could?” Peggy asks, the picture of fake innocence and drowning in relief at how much happier Angie seems. 

“The big galoot just ate some humble pie in front of me. He hasn’t done that since the last time Papa could dangle him by his ankles. Says he gives us his blessing, the whole nine yards.”

“Well, that’s good news?”

“Peggy Carter, I know your handiwork when I see it,” Angie reminds her. “And if that’s your way of putting things right between us too, well, that works for me I guess.”

Peggy reaches for Angie’s hand, squeezing it in lieu of a response.

“Do you think I’ll survive the festivities?” Peggy asks, seeing Jarvis pull up outside and make his leisurely way to join the throng. “Only I’m quite good at slipping away undetected, and this looks like a prime opportunity.”

“They’ll go easy on you,” Angie promises, but she doesn’t look confident. “For me, mostly, they just want to tell every embarrassing story they can think of. You might be getting Scotch and cigars, I’m not sure how much they’ve updated for me marrying a gal instead of a guy.”

“Wonderful,” Peggy groans. “Although at least Frankie won’t be sabotaging me every step of the way. That might help.”

“So you admit you did say something to him?”

“I admitted no such thing.”

“Peggy!” Andrea calls. “Come over here, it’s time to lead the party.”

“Wish me luck,” Peggy begs Angie, and is startled when she receives a sweet kiss on the cheek in response.

“See you back here tonight,” Angie tells her. “At least, if they don’t abandon you in the country somewhere.”

Peggy swallows hard, and hopes very much that her friend and fiancée is just having another joke at her expense.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bachelorette parties, after a fashion. But most importantly, a conversation in the barn.

“Miss Carter?”

“It’s Peggy, you idiot,” she hisses at poor Jarvis, approaching her like a lion tamer who’s misplaced his whip and chair. “Can’t you keep your cover straight for fully five minutes?”

“The tassels have discombobulated me. I apologize.”

“The tassels were a mercy,” Peggy groans. “I was fine with the tassels.”

“When Miss Martinelli mentioned the country, she was teasing you I assume?”

“Looks that way.” Peggy leans on the shaky iron railing of the buildings external staircase. In New York it would be classed a fire escape. Here it’s just an extension of the rather seedy pub they’ve been dragged to by Angie’s male relatives. “Or it’s possible she didn’t know.”

“If you want to come back in, I think there’s some actual dancers due on shortly?”

“As opposed to most of my future in-laws stripping to their skivvies?” Peggy demands with a shudder. “I’m only coming back in there if you keep the drinks coming. I don’t want to remember a moment more of this than is strictly necessary.”

“Deal.” Jarvis extends his hand. Peggy shakes it, holding on a few moments longer than necessary to ground herself. 

“Let’s get this over with,” she says through gritted teeth. 

***

Angie is practically floating by the time she gets back to Nonna’s, and not just because of the wine that’s been flowing since the moment they set out. She’s buzzed, sure, but she also spent the day being told a hundred funny, sweet and heartbreaking stories about marriage. All under the guise of preparing her for what lies ahead.

It’s easy, in the face of all that love and all those funny, smart women, to forget that Angie isn’t going to have it for real.

She avoids the main house and swings by the barn, since it’s still light enough. She’s expecting someone to notice and follow her, ruining her quiet moment at the end of a hectic day. She doesn’t expect the person leaping out from behind a tree to be Peggy. 

Peggy looks as ruffled as Angie has ever seen her. Her hair is limp where it usually curls perfectly, and her makeup has either worn away or faded into her face. She staggers just a little as she walks, which means she’s at least had as much to drink as Angie. That’s comforting, somehow; like they’re finally on a level footing. 

“Hey, English,” comes the lazy greeting. “I’m making a break for the barn. Wanna hide with me?”

“Hide?” Peggy seizes on the familiar word, before nodding furiously. She turns without quite falling and follows Angie to the scene of their blowout fight the other day. Angie doesn’t say anything when Peggy closes the door behind them. She lights the nearest lamp to combat the deep shadows undisturbed by the day’s fading light.

“So what did they do to you?” Angie asks, taking a seat on a bale of hay. “I’m denying every embarrassing story right up front, I’m warning you now.”

“Embarrassing stories would have been a gift,” Peggy answers, lost in a thousand-yard stare. “But the stripping. Oh Angie, the stripping.”

“My dad and brother took you to some Gypsy Rose Lee show? I’ll kill ‘em,” Angie announces, springing right back to her feet. “I shoulda known Frankie was up to no good again.”

“No, no,” Peggy interrupts. “They put on their own show. Just to ‘make sure’ I wasn’t going to ‘get my head turned’. That was a lot, Angie. I don’t mind telling you I’m a little shell-shocked.”

Angie bursts out laughing then at Peggy’s horrified expression. She’s no stranger to playing the drama queen either, but this is way more than Peggy usually lets slip through. 

“Well, you weren’t exactly queer to start with,” Angie attempts to soothe when she can catch her breath again. “You sure there wasn’t a cousin in there that caught your eye? You can always shop around once we’re divorced, right?”

“Oh for God’s _sake_ , Angie,” Peggy snaps. “Will you stop that? How many times do I have to kiss you before you take the hint that I’m at least as bent as a three-bob note? Though admittedly, not one hundred percent of the time.”

“As what as a who now?”

Peggy answers by grabbing Angie’s shoulders and planting one hell of a kiss right on her mouth. There’s no questioning in this one, no nerves in performing for a crowd. It’s the bigger, badder version of what happened last night, and Angie is weak in the knees from two seconds in.

“You’re saying you’d really go for girls regardless?” Angie forms the question after Peggy lets her go. “Wait… you mean you might actually like me, like me? But-”

“Enough with ‘but’,” Peggy groans. “I’ve been very careful not to confuse anything real with this favor you’re doing for me. I didn’t want to build things up only to let you down. I have a terrible, awful track record of making grand gestures and then never coming through. I couldn’t risk you being another one of them.”

“And now?” Angie can’t believe any of what she’s hearing. Can wine make a gal hallucinate?

“Now I’m tired. And frankly a little scandalized. While there will always been men I’ve cared for, and perhaps look at from time to time, I’m not some English rose too naive for the pleasures of other women. And even if you thought I was, why in God’s name wouldn’t you just ask me?”

“We were getting engaged! It didn’t seem like the time to see which ways you actually swung!”

“We’re getting married tomorrow,” Peggy reminds her, before dissolving into hysterical laughter. “Married! Oh God!”

“And I only just found out you haven’t been faking,” Angie groans, throwing herself back on the hay bale. “I’m a perfect idiot, I really am.”

Peggy comes across as she gathers herself, kneeling on the bale next to Angie and looming over her at a strange angle. It makes things feel a little bit like the sky is falling.

“I always said you were too good for me, Angela Martinelli,” Peggy says with newfound somberness. “I wasn’t lying about that.”

“Like hell you are,” Angie growls, grasping at the front of Peggy’s dress. Angie pulls her right down into kissing range, and this time it’s her turn to plant one on Peggy.

***

This was not the plan at all. Maybe it’s all the fresh Italian country air, but Peggy is through with caring about the plan, and common sense too for that matter. She’s lurching from disaster to fire, to chemical bombs falling from the sky, to finding an enemy agent under every rock she turns. It’s been years of living on those edges, of trusting no one for a second longer than necessary, and losing every single thing she set out to protect.

How can that track record withstand in the face of Angie’s grip on her dress, or the warmth of Angie’s lips against her own? Peggy is aware of her strengths, much as she is painfully aware of her weaknesses. In rare moments she might even admit that in one or two areas she is - whisper it - exceptional. But in the face of continuous and heightened temptation from Angie, the most loving and giving of people that Peggy has encountered on five continents so far, well Peggy isn’t exceptional at all. She is painfully, desperately human.

She places her hands either side of Angie, showing off by kissing her in some semblance of a push-up. There’s no time limit this time, no showboating for the sake of performance. There’s also nothing of the other night’s uncertainty and barely disguised trembling. Whatever shifted today has been a sea change, one from which Peggy is already sure she can never recover. 

Especially now Angie is kissing her neck. Scrappy, daring Angie who has channeled the strength of her grudging dance classes into turning them over, laying Peggy out on her back. The hay is scratching through her dress, but she can’t bring herself to care one jot. Not when Angie is using just the hint of her teeth to make Peggy gasp, sucking on the pulse point at the base of her throat. Oh, not hard enough to mark. Now with a house full of people who’ll stare and some kind of wedding photograph to come. But enough to let Peggy know there’s much more to promise from a mouth as talented as that.

“Jesus, Peg,” Angie breathes against her ear next, before nipping at Peggy’s earlobe. “What took us this long?”

“I have no idea, darling,” Peggy admits, the last syllable turning to air as Angie sucks on that earlobe with intent. “Let’s not rush though, now we’re here? I find myself quite carried away.”

“Carried away is right,” Angie agrees, her hands sliding over Peggy’s sides, gripping at her hips as though she can’t quite believe Peggy is real. “I want to carry you somewhere much fancier that this.” She straddles Peggy’s thigh then, and the moment Angie gently rolls her hips, they both know they’re done for. “But Christ, I don’t think I can hold out.”

“Then don’t,” Peggy smiles at her, for the blasphemy and the shared intoxication of sheer need. “I’m all yours for the taking.” She couldn’t say that to anyone else, wouldn’t dare. The old rules don’t apply here, not basking in the safety that Angie provides. 

Angie responds by grinding her hips with more intent. Her mouth is on Peggy’s collarbone a second later, tracing with the tip of her tongue. It’s just the right side of ticklish, and Peggy barely notices as the buttons of her dress are gradually undone. By the time Angie’s pulling the flimsy thing apart, Peggy is sliding her hands up the backs of Angie’s thighs, unable to resist exploring her body for a moment longer.

She digs her short nails into the supple flesh of Angie’s arse when Angie gets the bright idea to chart a course for Peggy’s breasts. The bra requires a little lifting and fumbling for a moment, but Peggy is nothing short of relieved once Angie guides the straps down over her arms. She’s naked but for her pants and stockings in this glorified hayloft, but Peggy can’t recall ever feeling more beautiful. There’s something like worship in Angie’s every touch, and it’s glorious. Even more so when Angie’s mouth first brushes over a stiff nipple. The jolt of sensation alone makes Peggy dangerously aware of how worked up she already is. 

“Please,” is all she can utter when Angie begins to flick with her tongue. It’s barely any pressure at all at first, a real tease. Then Angie settles into a rhythm of slow and steady licks that shoot straight from the lucky nipple right through Peggy’s body. Like an electrical current earthing, the real shock hits between Peggy’s thighs.

“So gorgeous,” Angie murmurs as she switches sides. Coping with the sensation a little better now, Peggy concentrates on easing Angie’s knickers down with a series of gentle tugs. Their mouths meet in another kiss as Angie pauses her attentions, and Peggy sees her chance to sit up and even things out. 

Still trading kisses, Peggy slides out of her own underwear and urges Angie to finish the job. They’re kneeling now, knees getting scraped and stockings getting torn, but even in a world where nylons are still rationed, Peggy considers it a noble sacrifice. 

“Together,” Angie instructs, and it’s devastatingly attractive when she takes the lead. She grips Peggy’s shoulders first, but her hands are roaming just a moment later. Peggy’s hands are resting on Angie’s parted thighs, but as Angie’s hands explore lower and lower, Peggy lets one hand wander in a more interesting direction; the other one continues to stroke the soft skin of Angie’s leg.

Peggy is the first to let her fingers chart a course through the wetness between Angie’s legs, and she’s frankly a little proud of how the woman is practically dripping for her already. Any lingering doubt is obliterated by the slickness of Angie beneath her fingertips, moaning with no care for volume levels the instant Peggy first grazes Angie’s clit.

Angie responds by cupping Peggy’s sex in turn, the pressure alone more than welcome. It’s nothing compared to the deft stroking from Angie’s fingers when she starts though, and it’s all Peggy can do to keep her own movements coordinated.

“Angie,” Peggy sighs as she gets her turn at kissing the lines of that exquisite throat. Angie’s head is dropped back, but her fingers are relentless even as she sobs Peggy’s name in broken syllables that Peggy feels vibrating against her lips. “Are you close, darling?”

Peggy’s only asking. Angie’s response is a shuddering cry that thrills Peggy beyond measure. She has two fingers inside Angie, and after a moment of stroking through her climax, Peggy adds a third and picks the pace up once more. 

“Goddammit,” Angie curses as she falls against Peggy. “You made me… holy … English!” 

And again. Peggy smirks, because she’s never been content with a four when she has the means to hit a six. Though six in this case might break Angie altogether, and that’s not the point at all.

“You,” Angie kisses her cheeks, her forehead, even her chin before capturing her lips again. It’s frenzied, and there’s some muttered Italian that still eludes Peggy, but she’s laughing into the kiss. Angie’s breathless and suddenly, devastatingly focused once Peggy pulls her fingers free. She licks each one, slowly, and it freezes Angie in place. Fascinated, Peggy realizes. Perhaps she hasn’t considered this before.

“You taste delicious,” Peggy purrs, and before she can add anything further, Angie is on her knees in front of the bale, pressing her mouth against Peggy while she kneels. 

“So do you,” is roughly what Angie seems to murmur before pressing an open-mouthed kiss right on Peggy’s aching clit. These are words even she doesn’t dare say out loud, not yet, but with the sensation so strong there’s no room for euphemism in her mind. Angie urges her to a sitting position, taking Peggy’s legs over her shoulders with a minimum of fuss. From that angle Angie pressure is merciless, and Peggy finds herself rocking against Angie’s tongue without much more provocation.

“Darling,” is all Peggy wants to say as she comes, clutching at Angie’s silky soft hair and riding a wave of release. She can’t recall it ever feeling so strong before, and by the time Angie stops, she’s almost painfully sensitive to the touch. Muscles are spasming, her heart is pounding and she’s so wildly in love with Angie when she smiles up from between Peggy’s thighs, that it’s enough to make her dizzy.

“Wow,” Angie says, wiping her mouth casually with the back of her hand.

“Kiss me,” is the most natural thing to fall from Peggy’s mouth. Angie doesn’t hesitate, and moments later Peggy’s on her back again, Angie pressed against her like she never considering fitting anywhere else at all.

***

“We should go in soon,” Angie murmurs from where her head is resting on Peggy’s shoulder. Peggy’s every bit as strong as Angie suspected, and she feels almost weightless in her arms. “If we can find all our clothes.”

“Another minute,” Peggy pleads, and Angie recognizes that note of fear beneath the simple request. It’s the reasonable fear that the minute they part, the minute they step outside of this old wooden building, what they’ve just shared will change forever. They’ll have a plan to follow through on, relatives and friends and intrusions at every turn. It should have made everything even more certain, but Angie can feel the doubt trickle between them like oil dripping from the bottle. 

“Sure,” Angie agrees, nuzzling Peggy’s soft skin and telling her brain to remember this exact moment. Peggy’s perfume, that fancy Miss Dior stuff she loves so much. The light scratch of hay against her side as she breathes. The sound of yelling voices in some far distant field. And the fading throb between her legs, and the slickness of her thighs as one lies on top of Peggy’s bare legs.

“Does this change-” Peggy starts to ask.

“We’ll stick to the plan,” Angie tells her with renewed confidence. It’s the only way to face down their fear. “They don’t need to know we’re starting a bit later than we said.”

“But Angie, what if this goes horribly wrong?”

“That’s… very you.” Angie can’t help it, she cracks up laughing. “I used to wonder what it was had you looking over your shoulder so much. Even now I know, I don’t think it’s a reason to assume every good thing that happens is going to blow up in your face. And hell, even if it does? Doesn’t that make it all the more important to actually have the happy part first?”

Peggy tilts Angie’s chin up so she can look at her more clearly.

“It’s not that simple,” she warns. “I’m not simply paranoid. Bad things happen to everyone I care about.”

“I’d rather be cared about than not,” Angie answers, and it’s as sincere as she knows how to be. “Didn’t we just live through years of it all being snatched away at any moment? You can’t plan around every hard time, English. Let it happen? Please?”

“You’re a terrible influence,” Peggy groans, but she kisses the top of Angie’s head all the same. A moment later, Peggy’s stomach grumbles. It’s enough to crack them both up laughing.

“Dinner?” Angie asks. “There must be food going by now. I’m surprised they didn’t send a search party already.”

They dress quickly, stopping to clasp hands for a second here and there, exchanging sly looks that only lead to more giggling. Angie is the one to head for the door first, throwing it open to take in the night sky.

“Get moving, wife-to-be,” Angie teases. “You’re the one with the monster to feed.”

“Not so fast,” says a clipped voice from somewhere outside the door. Angie can’t place it for a moment, but she gets it real fast when Dottie Underwood steps towards her, gun in her hand.


End file.
